Silent Mane: 1 & 2
by Tyr's Hoof
Summary: Re-uploading for a friend. The stories of Rainbow Dash and Rarity as they travel through the foggy town of Silent Mane.
1. Vacation

Vacation

The hot summer sun beamed through the tall window of Applejack's bedroom, shining directly on a large queen sized bed, which housed a precarious hump under its green apple checkered quilt. A soft groan broke the still morning, as a rainbow colored mane appeared at the foot of the bed, gasping for fresh air, only to find the hot air just as stifling. Before Rainbow Dash could complain inwardly, she heard the soft and indistinguishable sound of plates being set in the kitchen directly below her room. As if aware of the sound, the mares stomach rumbled.

'Even if it is only seven something in the morning, at least AJ already has breakfast going.' She thought, as she moved on to the open bedroom floor and did her usual morning stretches. She leaned forward, stretching her back legs, feeling a tightness in the mass of scar tissue that hung around her cutie marks. Next she leaned back, her rump in the air, her front legs stretched out in front of her. Her stomach ached where she had once been cut open, and the usual twang of sadness hit her as she would have normally stretched her wings at this point. Now, two sad little nubs resided where proud blue wings had once been.

"Up early for once?" A voice full of southern flare called from the open door frame. Applejack's bright green eyes were in a state of shock, the blue pony stretching before her was rarely up before ten.

"Yeah, sun woke me up. That and you shoved my head under the covers when I didn't want to wake up at six." Dash replied, crossing her fore legs and trying to look smug, but her playful smile threw off such an attempt. AJ smiled back, rolling her eyes.

"Well, ya have company." Dash nodded and reached for her Wonderbolts' hoodie, but AJ put up a hoof. "Its jus' Twilight sugercube." Their egghead friend came by fairly often, dropping off books for Dash, and generally just hanging out.

"She must have gotten up earlier than you to get here this early. Am I the only pony who got a good nights sleep in all of Ponyville?" AJ seemed to beam brighter than the sun at this.

"No nightmares? No dreams?" She rose an eyebrow, scrutinizing Dash.

"Not a one. Guess I can even recover better than most ponies."

AJ sighed. She loved Dash, but sometimes that whole superiority thing was either funny or not. Of course, talking at all about Dash's post traumatic stress disorder was a little stressful, but Dash treating it like a game, was almost agitating.

"Lets ask Twi 'bout it." AJ turned and led the way down to the kitchen. Twilight Sparkle sat on of the stools surrounding the large dining table. Her purple horn was glowing as she read a pamphlet, covering her face, with the words 'Silent Mane, your home away from home' written in white on the front. The unicorn lowered it as she heard AJ and Dash enter. AJ immediately went back to cooking, leaving Twilight and Dash to talk.

"Good morning, Rainbow Dash." She always sounded happy, especially around Dash. She was one of the few ponies that knew about Applejack's and Dash's romance.

"Only seven and your already face first in a book. Morning, by the way." Dash smiled, as she sat opposite the unicorn. Twilight spurt out a few syllables, before she finally let the joke slide.

"Its not a book. Its a pamphlet. There's a difference." She said, quiet and defensively.

"Oh, relax Twilight. I'm just playing. I didn't mean anything by it." She laughed at her friends flustered face. "What made you decide to come here so early anyway?"

"I got a present for you. From the Princess. I told her in one of my-"

"Wait. Did you just decided to tell the Princess or did she ask about me?" Dash interrupted, putting a hoof in front of Twilight's face.

"I told her you were getting-"

"Twilight! You don't have to make me sound like a charity case to everypony. I'm doing just fine! Didn't even have any dreams or nightmares last night." Dash crossed her arms and turned halfway from her friend.

"Oh, a whole night without any problems, you must be completely healed." Twilight put her hooves to her face, in mock surprise.

"Really? You think so too?" Dash was excited that someone finally saw her as healed.

"No. Now let me finish. The Princess had a good idea. There's a town called Silent Mane, its a humble little community in the west, and a lot of ponies go there to get clean air. And, legend has it, ponies who go there to get over the past always come back happier than ever and at peace." She smiled hopefully. Trying to convince the most stubborn of her friends was always a hellish task.

"No." Dash said flatly.

"Just no? No explanation?" Of course, Twilight figured this would be the response, but one can always hope.

"I don't need to go to some resort and be pampered. I just need-"

"Your going." Applejack said, finally coming over and joining in.

"What? There's no way I'm going. I don't want to go. I would just be bored there." Dash's voice quivered, anxious to avoid an argument with AJ.

"Ah know. But your bored here too. Ah thought ah could go with ya. Help ya get along, as it were." AJ blushed a slight bit. A vacation with here marefriend sounded heavenly. Dash didn't reply for the longest time, merely watching as AJ handed out plates of eggs and hay to her guests before sitting down with one of her own. Dash pushed her food around on her plate, deep in thought.

After everyone had eaten, Dash still had a full plate. Big Macintosh had come down by this point and she had given him her plate. No point letting it go to waste. Twilight got up as AJ showed her out. She stopped at the halls door and looked back to Dash.

"I need to tell the Princess your response. Is it still a no?" She smiled awkwardly, watching Dash squish her face in concentration.

"Yes." Dash sounded defeated. Applejack gave her a short glare.

"Oh. I'm sure the Princess will understand, everypony has their own methods of coping."

"I meant yes, Ill go." AJ and Twilight looked astonished. They didn't have to argue to convince her.

"In that case I'm sure the Princess will be ecstatic. The train leaves tomorrow at ten. Have fun you two." Dash heard the door close a few seconds later. She didn't know how to fell about the vacation. She didn't really want help that much, but it mattered to AJ, so she convinced herself it wouldn't be so bad.

"Yee-haw!" AJ came back running around the table, pulling Dash into a tight hug, bouncing all the while. "Ah am so proud of you accepting help. Its a good sign." Dash forced a sincere looking smile. She wasn't as excited. She felt a snake coiling around her stomach, knotting it. "Ah am gonna go and start packin'. See ya up in a minute."

At least AJ would be there to make it better.

Upstairs, AJ had a green bag sprawled across her bed, along with a few pieces of clothing. Mostly just shower towels, a nice saddle, boots, and a book about her favorite Cowpony, Hock Holiday. She beamed at Dash as she entered, who smiled awkwardly back. Applejack noticed it, and knew the cause.

"Look, Dash. Ah know that ya don't like to ask, receive, need, want, or be given help. But ah think that you could use some distance. From Ponyville. From Sugar Cube Corner. Mostly that last one." Dash didn't reply, merely moving over next to Applejack and sitting next to her.

"I still think its cool that I had a good night." Dash quietly joked.

"Ah know. And ah hope its a good sign. Ah hope its the first of many. But ya can never be too sure about it. You had a night last month that was uneventful."

"Yeah. I guess you might possibly be right." Dash smiled, and received a loving shoulder bump.

"Ya gonna help me pack, or just watch?"


	2. The Train

The Train

The train had only left a few minutes ago, yet it felt like it been underway for a few years. The car only had a few people on it, three stallions sat talking at the far front, while Rainbow Dash and Applejack sat towards the back. Behind them was a mare and a filly who were singing quietly together. Dash felt impatient, staring out the window in boredom. She hadn't slept well the night before, having another nightmare about Sugar Cube Corner. Pinkie Pie had held her locked in the basement, sawing here wings off. She had woken up in a cold sweat, screaming, with the words, 'Think Fast' still ringing in her ears. AJ had hushed her, holding her calmly and rocking her, letting her come back to reality. Needless to say, the two had lay awake for hours, staring into the darkness of the night.

She felt a flash of red light up her face as she remembered all this, and the embarrassment of crying out in the middle of the night like a filly wasn't helping. She felt Applejack give her a gentle nuzzle against her neck. Turning, she could see the worry in AJ's eyes, it felt like a dagger in her chest.

"How ya doin' sugercube?" She asked, her voice low.

"I'm just tired is all." She forced a smile, knowing the look of worry would be in AJ's face for the duration of the trip.

"Ah am too. Ah just didn't want to sleep while ya had to stay up. Ah would feel terrible if these folks saw ya have another bad dream." She grinned sheepishly back, resting her head on Dash's shoulder. Dash let her head fall, resting comfortably on AJ's. As they sat, Dash could hear Applejack's breath slowly become shallow as she drifted to sleep. Dash stifled a yawn as her own breathing became shallow. She slowly passed out.

Wake up.

Dash woke with a start, as if somepony had screamed in her ear. She immediately noticed the lights were dimmed and the window no longer showed a happy sunny countryside but a wall of darkness. She couldn't see anything beyond the car. She also noticed the car had stopped, and AJ had left her side. All the ponies in the car were gone as far as she could tell. All was still. She stood from her seat, and moved into the aisle. Straining to see, she could make out very little on either side of her. The door to exit the car was directly in front of her, but it wasn't connected to a platform.

The train had stopped in the middle of nowhere. Dash would need a flashlight to continue her search, and she knew she had packed one in her bag, which would be in the next car on her right. Deciding this was the best course, she headed right, and being only three seats from the back made it a small trip, the red door had a notice about opening while the train was moving, which Dash promptly ignored and slid open. There was a sudden gush of air as cold air from outside rushed into the nearly vacant car. Shivering, Dash pushed on, taking the small distance between the cars in stride. The cargo car was devoid of life, only the neatly stacked suitcases and duffel bags filled the large car.

Her bag was a simple red one, with a green cored apple on it. She had borrowed it from Big Macintosh, since it would allow her to pack more than just clothes. Walking along the left wall, she reached the halfway point when a clatter made her jump a whole three feet. One of the bags that adorned the wall was only slightly unzipped, and a coin had fallen out. Dash lifted it, looking it over. It was of solid brass and heavy in her hoof, she noticed that carved into the front was the letter 'h'. She placed it back in its bag of origin.

'Weird. I've never seen money like this. I guess people from all over Equestria come here.' she though to herself as she continued her search. She found her bag only a couple more down, three from the bottom. She struggled to pull it away from the wall for a moment or two, before it finally budged, and the pile toppled down around her. She quickly pushed all the bags aside, and opened hers. Inside, her hastily packed clothes were missing, replaced by a white saddle that had an attached vest along with its dual sided saddle bags, her flashlight, a black police baton, and a large pile of coins. She took the saddle vest, and looked for a name of an owner, and after finding none simply decided that maybe AJ had packed it for her. It was well made, something that even Rarity would have admired. It had a strap across the shoulder for a flashlight, opening a ponies mouth to carry other things. She noticed it had another across the chest, for something smaller, and two more on either side of her front legs. She slipped the saddle vest on, it fit snugly, and she attached her flashlight to it. Now she would have light in whatever direction she faced. Next she looked over the baton, it was solid steel, a chrome black, with a weight in the handle so a pony could keep their balance as they used it. It fit perfectly in the strap on her right shoulder.

As for the coins, there were twenty five of them, each one had a different letter of the alphabet. The 'h' was missing though, obviously back in that other bag. Not really knowing what to do with the pile, she left it in her bag, and began to make her way back to her car, her flashlight now illuminating the train car. Facing the door she discovered someone had written on the wall next to it, getting closer she made it out as a riddle:

Remember, remember the 6th of _arch

The day the first was covered in _arch

Her body in a field of _orn

Missing her precious _orn.

The first letter of each last word was missing, and a small round indentation took their places. Dash tried the door, inserting her hoof into the rectangular hole, to find that it had locked behind her. She walked back around the compartment again, looking for any other exits. The emergency exits on the roof were the only ones she cold find, and they were boarded up from the inside. Finally looking back at the riddle, she began to rack her brain over it. The first letter was easy, March was missing its 'm'. She skipped the second line and focused on the third. There was only one kind of vegetable with orn in its name, 'c'orn. Which meant that the second line was missing an 'st' for starch. The first victim had been a unicorn, she remembered reading about that when the full case of the Cupcake Killer had come out and been, and still was, national news.

She placed the four coins, staring blankly at the 'h', a small ember of anger in her heart for bringing her memories back. She placed it in its indentation, and the door gave an audible click. Dash pulled it open, the cold air rushing in again. The first car was still empty, but her flashlight made it possible for her to see easier. Making her way, she became aware of how silent it was, a chill slowly running up her spine. Continuing on, she made her way to the next car, the dining car. It was different in design than the others, on the right was a row of tables, each with two stools under them. On the left was a counter with a glittering marble surface. The sound of low static caught Dash's attention. It was coming from behind the counter.

She went around to the little horizontal door, and flipped it, almost jumping at the sight beyond. The floor had collapsed, and around its jagged wooden edges was blood, splattered all over the back of the counter. A small square radio hung by a thin black strap around one of the protruding wooden spikes. It was emitting a loud hiss of static, as she reached down for it, she heard the sound of the far car-to-car door opening. She crouched immediately, poking her head over the counter. The creature that came into the car made her almost vomit. It appeared to be a pony, with a light brown coat, it was however slightly larger and its entire skull was ripped open, split all the way down to the chest, and both sides of the head seemed to move independently. She almost threw herself down to the floor, whimpering slightly. She could hear it coming closer, each of its steps a loud thunk on the floor.

The static of the radio grew louder with each step it took. That was probably why its getting closer, Dash though to herself. Still hiding, she heard the sound of it leaving the car, and risking a quick glance over the counter, she watched its twin heads snake in the air of the next car. Dash gingerly took the radio, and placed it on the strap on her left shoulder. If it told her when something like that was getting closer, than she would never part with it...


	3. First Blood

First Blood

Rainbow Dash tiptoed around the corner of the counter, the buzzing of her radio slowly fading as she did so. The split headed creature continued wandering slowly towards the cargo car. The thought occurred to her that maybe one of those things could have gotten to Applejack, but with an actual shake of her head, she forced the thought away. Applejack was to strong, to fast, and to smart to be caught and hurt by such a thing, she told herself. She turned and headed for the next car, in the opposite direction of the split headed pony.

Dash opened the door to the platform between cars as quietly as she could, yet it still made a loud grinding sound. Craning her head around, she could hardly tell if the monster had heard. It was an insane thought that it could hear her from two cars over, but it was an equally insane thought that a pony could walk around with its head split open. Sliding the door closed again, she completely ignored the cold air, instead staring intently at her radio. It was releasing a quiet moan of static. She attempted to look into the next car, but the window was covered with a board. The radio became slightly louder as she got closer to the door.

'There must be another in there. If I had wings, I could fly over.' A small feeling of remorse washed over her. She waited a few more moments, breathing deeply, trying to ward off her own nerves. She placed her hoof in the handle, and with only a moment of hesitation, slowly pushed it open. A small crack formed before the door suddenly jerked open. The elongated neck of a split headed pony closed around Dash's neck faster than she could react. The hardened bone of its spine clamped down on her neck, and its flaccid skin did the same, making her skin crawl in disgust. She brought her front legs up and kicked at the thing, her left hoof inserted itself into the neck and was clamped down on as well. Her right hit worthlessly against the side of its neck. It pulled her into the dark of the car, and threw her into the aisle.

She rolled, felling the steel baton dig into her side as she did so. The scream of static from the radio focused her, as she hastily got to her hooves. The creature had only just begun to take its first step towards her. She thought about running. It was the first thought in her head, and the first to be dismissed. Rainbow Dash didn't back down from a challenge. She turned her head, grasping the handle of the baton, and pulled it from its strap. The creature was unfazed, it felt no fear as the smaller blue pony waved the baton at it, staring back at her through lifeless eyes.

Its right head began to pull back, its mouth wide open. In response, Dash craned her head right, and waited. It signaled its attack by moving the muscles in its lower neck first, like a tidal wave, crashing down on a beach, its right head came down. She struck a fraction of a second later, the baton connecting with its teeth a scant few inches from her mouth, the rest of the baton hitting against the neck itself. The head thrashed, slamming into a seats armrest. She pulled back instantly and struck again, and the head fell limp to the floor. A sudden piercing pain racked the right side of her body at the shoulder.

The other head had clamped down, its teeth digging greedily into her. She could feel it shifting its jaw, trying to grind deeper without letting go. She tried to adjust the baton in her mouth but to no avail, hoping to switch the side sticking out of her mouth. Instead, she shot her head right, letting the point of the baton punch into its open throat. It let out a hoarse cry and tried to pull away, letting go of her, but she brought the baton down on its neck. As the head slammed against the floor, Dash brought the baton down again and again, breaking a small indention into the things skull. It thrashed after the third swing, convulsed, and finally stopped. It fell down, its legs sliding away from it.

Dash backed away, her radio was quiet, but her mind was racing and her body was still reeling from the encounter. She slowly placed the baton back in its strap. Every fiber of her being was quivering, adrenaline was still pumping through her system. Letting out a silent gasp, she gagged a little, almost doubling over. After nearly a minute of retching, she stood up on shaky legs. She turned away from the body, no longer wanting to see the crumpled carcass. She was in another passenger cabin, deserted just like the rest. She began to slowly make her way through when she came across a seat with a white set of saddle bags sitting on it. For a second she felt a small ember of hope ignite in her chest, but ultimately, she realized that there was little chance somepony else was alive on the train.

Opening one side, Dash found a brown bottle that read 'Flim and Flam's Mighty Restorative Drink: One drink will bring you back from the brink.' A small picture of the two was on the front of the bottle. They were smiling and had a leg around the others shoulder. Looking at her shoulder, she was alright. She could see the outline of teeth and dried blood, but the wound was shallow, and the bleeding had stopped on its own. She placed it back in the bag and opened the other. Inside was a newspaper clipping. She took it out, and placed the saddle bags across her back and placed the clipping on the seat, shining her light over it. The top of the article was ripped, but the middle and end was in good condition:

'have no idea what could have possessed her to do that.' Mrs. Cake said, shock in her voice,'She always did such a good job taking care of the store.'

Mr. Cake had no comment and asked the Canterlot Tribune reporter to leave, preferring to mourn in his own way.

After the interview, our reporters were able to look into the crime scene, finding the bone covered walls and furniture to be highly disturbing. However, most disturbing was the cold hard fact that the murdered had been one of Equestria's most famous party ponies. It is now generally believed by staff at the scene that Pinkamena Diane Pie had developed a split personality that was bent on making cupcakes from the bodies of several ponies. Needless to say, Sugar Cube Corner is now giving out compensation to all customers who have purchased cupcakes in the past eight months.'

Dash bit her lip. She didn't condone what Pinkie Pie had done and to bring it up still made her feel like the nails were being placed into her hooves again. Shaking the image from her head, Dash continued on, the only car left would be the Conductors engine...


	4. Eye of Misery

Eye of Misery

Cold air rushed in as Dash opened the sliding door to the outside. The darkness seemed to intensify, her flashlight barely lighting the door opposite hers. Taking a few step forward, she could make out the door frame, it had marks around the edge, like something had been drug through and had fought back viciously. Applejack had to be in the next car, and Dash hoped that the marking around the door weren't hers. Breathing heavily at the prospect of finding an injured, or worse, Applejack in the next car, she almost jumped when the radio began to emit static. The sound of the door sliding open behind her made her freeze as a cold sweat formed on her brow.

Looking over her shoulder, a split headed pony was trying to maneuver around the half open door. Rushing, Dash ran for the next car this time. 'No more foaling around', she thought to herself, she had to find AJ. The engine car was quiet and pitch black. Her flashlight was still weak in the darkness, only illuminating a foot or two before her. The darkness was suffocating, the radios static hummed loudly at her, and a new sound of something rustling in the darkness distracted her. She felt her heart begin to race, and the darkness pressed in on her, just as she began to see something at the very edge of her vision. A white foreleg kept darting out of her view, as she felt like she was about to hyperventilate. She pushed her rump against the door, slowly sidestepping to her left, trying to remove the other things angle of attack.

"Think Fast!" The words screeched through the car, in that cheery voice. Dash froze in a moment of inescapable terror, every muscle in her body tensed up. The static of the radio began to scream so loudly it was all she could hear. Something massive hit her from the right, slamming her into the cars corner, and holding her there, grinding her into the wall. It felt like a massive stump of rounded, hairless flesh. The overhead lights burst into life, blinding Dash for a moment. The pain in her side was intense, but it was a dull pain and easily ignored. The thing that held her might have once been a pony, but it was far from such a thing now.

It was massive in size, at least twice the height of Celestia, and it could have weighted at least 400 pounds. Dash only came up to its chest, and that was only if one measured from the very top of her head. It was a light tan color, and all of its appendages ended in rounded stumps that were to narrow at the base to properly support it, as it swayed back and forth, trying to keep its balance. Its tail and mane had been cut off, its face was a long snout, as round as a bucket. It wore a strange leather piece around the massive snout, that tied around the back of its head to help support its massive mouth. At the end of the snout it had no nose, only a small horizontal slit on the blunt end of the snout. A sharp and wicked looking tongue flicked in and out of the slit.

Dash quickly looked around the room, looking for anything to help her escape the beast. The car was twice as tall as the others, with a rather empty floor space, and a large and tall box centered against the far wall. The voice that had called out was gone, leaving her alone with the beast. She felt the pressure of the creature let up as it pulled its massive leg away, ready to deliver a killing crush. Dash brought her back legs up, and kicked against the wall, throwing herself at the same time. She tumbled forward as its leg dented into the wall, the steel crushing around its hoof. Dash had rolled forward, landing on her back, and immediately threw herself on her side and rolled a few more feet. Launching herself up, she pulled the baton out in one fluid motion. It slowly turned towards her, its head facing her and its body slowing following.

It lumbered towards her, its entire body swayed with each step, like a giant mannequin responding to the slightest movement of the strings. She planned her attack, wanting to strike first, but not wanting to get within range. Despite its size, it was able to correct itself quickly when she had made small attempts to move to its right or left. Waiting for it to get close enough, she turned her head to the right, ready to strike its legs when it went for the kick. Towering over her, it brought its left leg up precariously, and then shot out with all the speed of a running turtle. She moved left and turned her head to the left, striking with the point of the baton. The massive limb grazed the floor, just as her baton met it's side full force. The skin was soft and buckled easily, the baton actually sinking past the flesh. A black liquid came out, making a thick vein down the side of the leg. Before Dash could pull back and escape, its elongated head shoved itself under her body. It jerked upward suddenly, taking her off her feet and she felt its spear like tongue cutting into her underside. It threw her with such force she felt the ceiling impact with her skull. She felt her baton fall from her mouth as she slammed into the floor once more.

She landed with her head grazing the front of the metal box, and now a searing heat burnt into her skull. The box was burning hot. She pulled her entire body to her right, despite her stomach and head protesting loudly in pain. She clenched her teeth and squirmed on the floor, begging the pain to go away. She could feel her blood leaking out, realizing that the cut across her underside wasn't so bad, just painful. Suddenly the thing loomed over her again, and with a swifter motion, punted her against the wall. The pain in her stomach flared up, and now a deep dull pain formed in her back. She would have let out a a scream of pain, but the wind had been knocked out of her from the punt. It was standing over her again, its leg raised. Rainbow Dash wasn't about to go out without a fight, and she painfully lunged up towards its leg, sinking her teeth into the creatures leg. It tasted like a rotten orange. If it felt any pain, it didn't show it.

Before it could bring its foot down, the sudden cry of a siren filled the air. The beast turned its head, almost like it was just curious about the sound. It shook Dash from its foot and slowly made its way to the back door. Dash stared in confusion as it reached the door, opened it and then slowly slid its massive body through. It took a minute or two to accomplish, but it managed. She felt suddenly lightheaded as all of her new injuries washed over her in a shower of pain. Reaching into her saddlebag, she took the brown Restorative bottle out. The cap was designed with a niche for a pony to put their tooth under and pull the cap off.

It tasted like Applejack's baked bads. She chocked down the mouthful of liquid and the effect was immediate. Her head and back no longer hurt, her stomach was now completely unmarred, excluding the scars Pinkie Pie had given her. As she shook her head and willed the taste out of her mouth, she heard the sound of soft weeping. It was coming from the metal box. Dash didn't hesitate, finding a handle on the lower third of the box, she yanked it open, feeling the heat of the metal on her teeth. Inside was a pile of coals, red hot, a few falling onto the open door as she opened it. There was no one inside. Dash hovered her head just above the door, peering up into the top of the box. She could only see a slim view of the top, but there was a pony hanging by burnt leather straps in the box.

"Go away." the pony said, its voice a quiver of misery.

"Its okay. My name is Rainbow Dash, and I can help." Dash replied, pulling her head out and looking for a handle to open the top side. She found one, higher up, and had to stand on her back legs to reach it, but it wouldn't budge.

"You ,of all ponies, can't help me. I deserve this for the things I did." The voice said. Dash shook her head, even if the other pony couldn't see it.

"Nopony deserves this. Let me help you." Dash pulled again, the metal burning the corners of her mouth.

"There is one thing you could do. On the side, there's a button. Press it." The other said.

Dash looked on the side and recoiled in disgust when she saw a piece of paper declaring what the pink button did. It was meant to stop the life support of the pony inside.

"There has to be something else I can do. Just let me-" Dash began

"No. Its that or leave me here. I don't expect you to feel sorry for me after what I've done. I understand if you would prefer I suffer."

Dash felt nauseous at the idea. "Please, I can-"

"NO. You asked, the button or nothing" The voice raised its voice.

Dash sighed and felt a heavy pull in her heart, like a stone was dragging it down. "For what its worth, whatever you did, I forgive you." She pushed the button down and held it for a long moment. She heard he pony on the inside begin to let out a faint gasp before falling silent. The train began to move slowly. She felt a tear roll down her cheek.

She hated this place. She made her way back to the previous passenger car, now strangely devoid of the split headed pony, and the darkness was replaced with a thick fog. She sat on one of the seats, and wondered what she could have done differently for that pony. The trains horn blared as it approached a station.

Applejack threw the first split headed creature off of her and as it stumbled to her left, she jumped back, just as the second split head's right head came down, slamming into the concrete of the train station. She breathed heavily, having been playing this game of evasion for at least twenty minutes. She wanted to stay at the station, in case Dash showed up. Her first instinct had been of course, the police station, but that had turned into a fiasco. She silently prayed to Celestia that she would never have to go back there. In the distance, a train horn broke through the thick fog...


	5. Reunion

Reunion

As the train slowed, Dash could make out three shapes on the platform. The first two were more of the split headed ponies, and the third was a pony wearing a brown cowpony hat, and black vest that read POLICE on it in bright yellow colors. Dash immediately recognized Applejack. She felt the pain of her choice begin to fade, and jumped from her seat, rushing to the door. It felt like an eternity had passed when it finally stopped.

Dash rushed out, and reached for her baton. She had forgotten to pick it up after dealing with the boxed pony. She charged forward anyway, her head head high, and caught one of the creatures off guard. "Get away from her!" She shouted, ramming one of the creatures and pushing it off the platform, as it buckled under her sudden assault.

"Rainbow!" AJ sounded both surprised and excited, but quickly turned her attention back to the split head that had attempted to bite through her vest. AJ felt nothing as it failed to penetrate, hitting it squarely in its open neck with a front leg. It released its hold and stumbled back, but AJ continued, turning and bucking it in the chest. It rolled onto its side, both of its heads writhing in pain.

Turning back to her friend, she felt the full weight of Rainbow Dash throw itself on top of her, Dash's front legs wrapped around the farm ponies neck.

"There, there, sugarcube." Applejack said quietly to Dash, while stroking her back. "Ah'm glad to see you to sweetie, but we gotta get outta here. Tain't safe."Dash had tears welling in her eyes when she pulled back and helped AJ to her feet. "And ah know of someplace safe. Jus' follow me."

AJ moved at full gallop, moving through the town like she knew every square inch of it. She ran in the middle of the road, and rounded corners that Dash would have never have known were there. Dash followed, and could make out shapes in the fog, she knew it was more of the monsters. They must have passed at least twenty by the time they rounded one final corner, coming across a two story Motel that was strangely devoid of the thick fog. A large neon sign claimed it was The Shetland Inn. Applejack slowed to a trot and went to the far left, where a set of stairs led to the second level. Dash followed her up and into the third room on the left.

The small motel room was quaint, with a large bed on the left side from the door, a couch at the foot of the bed, a closet next to the front door, and a bathroom straight across. AJ held the door as she went it, closed it behind her, locking the door, and threw herself almost on top of Dash. The two pushed up against each other, front legs wrapped around each other. Dash immediately formed a list of things she wanted to say to AJ, but one thought kept pushing to the front of her mind: The Box Pony.

"Applejack. I made a mistake." Dash's voice cracked a little more than usual as she stifled a silent sob.

"It ain't your fault, sugarcube. You didn't know this town was like this." AJ tried to comfort her, rubbing her back once more. Dash was worried about how she would take the next part.

"No that. Well that to, but there's something else too. I met a pony on the train. She was in pain. And I..." It was hard to choke back the thought of what she had done. She didn't know whether or not to feel bad or prideful of what she did. She had saved another pony from suffering, even if it was at a steep cost. Applejack and Dash had both pulled apart, but AJ's head was still resting on Dash's back.

"I killed another pony." She felt Applejack hold her breath in. 'No matter what, even if she hates me for, I'll still be there for her. I wont let this destroy my friendship with her.' Dash kept repeating in her head while AJ said nothing for a long while. When she finally did, it wasn't with a voice quivering with rage or hatred, but a low whisper.

"Ah trust you Dash, more than ah trust anypony else. Ah just want to know...why you did it." Dash told the story of her adventure on the train, of the massive pony, which she called Beast, and of the pony in the box. She came to face her choice with the pony in the box, and sobbed openly. AJ had leaned against her as they spoke, having moved to the comfort of the bed to talk, laying on their stomachs side by side in the center of the bed. When Dash finished, her head had sunk down. After another long silence, Applejack placed her snout under Dashes chin and lifter it up.

"Ah understand and ah think...ya did the right thing. It sounds wrong when ya think about it, but if it was me in the same situation, Ah'd have made the same choice." The Element of Honesty never lied. Dash smiled for the first time in what felt like an eternity.

"You have no idea how much it means to me to hear you say that." Dash nuzzled AJ's neck, before asking, " But what happened to you?"

"Nothin' near as bad as what ya went through. Ah woke up on a park bench, found ma way through the fog to a police station. There ah fought one of those split headed ponies. Ah found this vest and solved a riddle at the entrance, something bout a sad pony eatin' the happiness of her friend." Applejack both couldn't nor wouldn't recall the memory of the riddle. It had gone into the grisly details of torturing ponies."There were...other things wrong with that station. But Ah feel that they would best be...left out, as it were."

Dash could tell that Applejack was shook up from her adventure. "So...," Dash started, trying to the break the silence for the umpteenth time, "What's our plan now?"

"Well, we could stay and wait here a spell, rest up. Than we go find a phone." Applejack moved while talking, laying her head against the light red pillows at the the head of the bed.

"A phone. So we can call Celestia and tell her to never send ponies here again?" Dash followed, but instead of the pillow next to AJ, she rose and fell backwards, in a mock trust fall. The earth pony jolted up for a second as Dash's head collided with her ribcage. Dash smiled up at AJ, a slight blush forming on her cheeks. AJ smiled back, and put her head back down on the pillow, staring up at the ceiling.

"No offense to the Princess, but this trip was the worst idea ever. Of all time. Besides that , where are we gonna find a phone?" Dash snuggled up next to AJ, who absentmindedly placed a front leg around Dash's shoulder.

"There's one in the office of the motel. Its locked though. Should be able ta call Twilight." AJ's sentence's had begun to fall apart as she fought the urge to fall asleep. Looking down, Dash had already fallen asleep, and was quietly squirming against Applejack's chest. Than Rainbow Dash began to scream, and flail...

Flying. Her wings were flapping so effortlessly that she felt she could have bested the Wonderbolts at any sport of their choosing. She carelessly glided around clouds, the warm sun and the smell of freshly baked apple pie from the ground miles below marked the day as perfect. She felt weightless, and began to pick up her speed, trying to make a Sonic Rainboom that didn't require a dive bombing.

The pressure in the air began to bombard her ears, they quickly popped and she redoubled her efforts, pushing her wings to the max. She could feel the air began to thin as the sound barrier began to stretch and curve against her. 'One more push' she thought ,encouraging herself, and she felt it give way. The audible boom and rainbow after effect streaked behind her, as she realized that she was outpacing her own streak.

Ahead of her, she noticed a dark cloud. She knew that a rain storm was scheduled in a few days, but nothing of this size. It stretched from one corner of the sky to the other, and was stagnant. She began to flail mid-air trying to slow down her body before she entered the cloud system. She could see the lightning and heard a most peculiar form of thunder. It sounded like her name...

Dash was flailing against Applejack, who had wrapped front legs around her and moved to a sitting position and now held Dash against her in a tight hug. Dash struggled for a moment or two more, before she realized she was awake.

"Whoops. Sorry AJ." She smiled and blushed. The earth pony released her and gave her a worried look.

"What did ya dream about this time?" She wasn't curious, she just knew it made Dash feel better to talk about it. Dash knew that AJ had already decided that she had dreamed of Pinkie Pie.

"I was flying. I had my wings, and I made a Sonic Rainboom while flying horizontally, than some stupid cloud ruined it." She gushed, excited about such a positive dream. When she had abruptly ended her story, AJ looked flabbergasted. She began to scrutinize Dash with her stare.

"And the cloud was shaped like Pinkie Pie?" AJ assumed that the Cupcake Killer had something to do with the horror.

"Nope."

Your tellin' me that ya had a good dream? No horror, no relivin' the past?" Dash nodded in return. "Alright, than ya mind tellin' me why ya woke up screamin and hollerin'?"

"The cloud was shooting lightning, and I couldn't slow down. That's a death sentence for a Pegasus." She smiled and slowly, Applejack did too. Applejack threw her front legs around Dash and pulled her back down.

"Maybe this trip ain't so bad after all. When we get outta here, Twilight will want to hear all about this." Applejack yelled into Dash's face, who was mere centimeters away. They were both smiling at each other, their eyes shifting to and fro as they both tried to take in every detail of the others eyes. Dash quickly puckered and pursued her lips, audibly gulping.

Dash's head darted forward, her lips touching Applejacks for just a moment before immediately pulling away again. AJ's smile intensified. Dash wasn't too big on showing affection like that. It always sent such a tingling sensation through Applejack's mouth and tongue. But Dash had pulled away, not really sure if she wanted more. Applejack was the more open in the bedroom, but Dash was almost always the one to take it to the bedroom, even if she couldn't really contribute there.

They untangled their forelimbs and settled back next to each other, slowly drifting into a dreamless sleep...


	6. Descent

Descent

Applejack gently rocked Rainbow Dash with a slight push to her shoulder. The Pegasus squirmed and threw the blankets over her head, mumbling about just a few more minutes of sweet sleep. Applejack bit down on the blanket, tugging it off entirely. The Pegasus flailed on the bed, throwing herself around on the mattress. Finally opening her eyes, Dash gave AJ a pleading stare.

"No. Its time ta go, Dash." She put her head down on the bed, forcing a smile. Neither of them wanted to go back out there. But sitting in that room wouldn't get them anywhere.

They both just wanted the nightmare to be over.

"Fine, I'm up." Dash sighed, blowing her messy mane out of her eyes, before lazily slipping off the side of the bed. AJ rolled her eyes, and started to head for the door. She noticed her vest and saddle bags laying in the corner.

"Did you...undress me?" She felt a heat rush into her face as she slid them both back on.

"Yep. Ya were uncomfortable and sweatin, so I took em off ya. Hope that's alright."

"Oh, yeah. Of course." She couldn't remember being undressed, but she felt a little sad that she hadn't been awake with her.

"Wait." Dash suddenly spoke as the earth pony reached to undue the singular lock.

"What?"

"I want to go out there first. I have this radio. It tells me when those...thing are around." It was mostly true. She didn't want AJ to open the door first and be attacked. She didn't want to see AJ get hurt.

"Alright, if ya say so. Just be careful. Or as careful as ya can be." AJ undid the lock, a simple chain and ball style lock. She then moved aside, so Dash could gingerly crack the door open an inch or two. The radio began to buzz, like a struck wasps nest. Than a distinct voice, one of cheer and merriment, filled the radio waves.

" But some mysteries bite and bark, and come to get you in the dark." The radio screamed static, like when Dash had fought the Beast on the train. The door shot inwards, breaking off its hinges in a shower of splinters. Dash was thrown back, while AJ was only startled back a foot or two.

Dash saw the world go white for a moment, and than her vision came back, a massive blur. She shook her head, realizing that her hearing was out too, and it was slowly coming back. She tried to move from her laying position, and her body screamed in refusal from the pain. Over the din her ears were making, she could hear a constant shrill sound, like a...scream. Dash's head shot up, looking past her chest to see Applejack pinned by some new monster.

The new monster was defiantly a mare, the only away Dash could tell this was its shorter and sender form from the split headed ponies. It's skin was a patchwork of various colors and it was stretched over the form of the pony. However, it was painfully obvious that its internal organs and muscles had been removed, as the skin was tight against its bony form. The skin on the head had been pulled and stretched over the eyes, nose, and mouth, sealing them off. Around its mouth was a leather strap ,nails securing it to the face of the new thing. Its hooves had a circle of nails pointing outward.

The skin mare was on its hind legs, bringing its hooves down in wide and powerful swings, the nails imbedding themselves into Applejack's lower back. The earth pony had been turned side ways from the doors destruction. With each swing, the skin mare's swings sped up,as if the screams of her victim were encouraging her.

Dash felt every muscle in her body freeze up and terror griped her. The thing was some sick remake of the dress that Pinkie Pie had worn in that dark basement.. Memories, repressed with fear and pain, came flooding back, like a tidal wave. The scent of the motel room began to smell like the basement, the warm smell of death wafting into her nostrils. She heard her own voice begin to scream in the depths of her mind

The screaming was all Dash could hear, her entire head was filled with the sound and no thoughts could get through. Standing on uneasy legs, Dash wobbled with each step, she was mumbling something, but couldn't for the life of her hear the words coming out of her own mouth. It was like she was on auto pilot. She was only a few feet away when her voice began to raise itself, emitting her own savage screams as she began to charge. She slammed into the side of the skin mare, hearing the nails in Applejack's skin tear out larger gouges. She slammed the mare into the wall, and felt its bones and skin writhe against her, she reared back, and brought her hooves against its skull. It continued to squirm and she began to slam hoof blow after hoof blow against its skull, screaming all the while. It slowly slid down the wall, its entire body quivered from the blows. Dash reared back, and brought her full weight down on the mare's skull, and with a satisfying crack, felt it give way.

Sense came rushing back, her entire body was on fire with pain, and her hooves felt like they were about to burst apart. Her breath came out in ragged breaths, snot was running down the front of her face, and her eyes were welling up. What little air she could get was being chocked out by sobs she was trying to repress. She gnashed her teeth together, grinding them in an attempt to fight back the tears.

"Dash." Applejack was trying to limp over to her, and so Dash turned, hoping to meet her half way. Applejack's left back leg was torn up, the bone in her hip visible in one spot, just beside her tail.

"It was going after mah cutie mark. Is that what set ya off?" Dash fell onto her side, her energy wasted. She mumbled and felt a little droplet of drool fall from her mouth. She looked at AJ's flank, and indeed, most of the skin around the three apples was where most the damage was. She needed to get to the bottle in her saddle bag.

Applejack stooped low, placing a shoulder against Dash's and helping her up. She helped the Pegasus move away from the body, back towards the bed. Dash sat on her haunches at the foot of the bed, and turned to grab the bottle from her saddle bag.

"Here," she said placing it in front of Applejack, " Drink this. You'll feel better." She lowered her head and grabbed the bottle in her mouth, lifting it up to AJ who, after two attempts got the neck of the bottle in her mouth. She took two large gulps before she jerked away from the taste. AJ coughed loudly as Dash placed the bottle back on the floor and helped herself to a small sip from it.

Dash was trying to put the lid back on the bottle when AJ lifted it and stabbed the bottle into Dash's mouth. "Ya needsth ta drinksh some taa." she grumbled with the bottle in her mouth. Dash gave a weak glare back, and tried to turn her head to find that AJ had already healed, and was able to keep up with her sluggish, pained movements. Finally submitting, she took in a mouthful and swallowed it slowly.

"Happy now?" She asked, a little annoyed.

"Yea." There was a long silence as they tried to awkwardly avoid eye contact.

"You ready?" Dash broke the silence, standing up again. AJ nodded and they headed out the door. Dash went second, trying to keep her head away from the thing in the doorway. Outside, the fog had been replaced by the thick blackness of night. The radio remained silent at least. They carefully headed down the stairs, and a small wooden sign declared the office around the lime green corner of the building.

The small carriage lot in front of the office was empty, even of carriages. The door to the office was locked, with a poem written on the front, and they both silently read it to themselves:

"In my haste, I learned regret

In my haste, I lost my soul

The Heart must never know,

What the mind must _"

The last word was blank, with an indentation in its spot. Dash sighed, she knew they would have to go hunting for something that could fit into the whole, and she had a sneaking suspicion that AJ had not yet had to solve a puzzled of her own.

"Hey Dash, Ah'm gonna go back up ta the room and see if ah can't get us some weapons. Chair legs, or maybe some pipes. Then we can can get set on solvin this thing." Dash numbly nodded and followed. As AJ went up the stairs, Dash saw movement, a door silently opened itself on the first level. Looking up the stairs, AJ kept walking up, and Dash quietly slipped away, and into the room.

The room was dark. Darker than it was outside, and the sound of a deep throaty moan could be heard from the center of the room. As she walked in, she heard the door close behind her. The room was different than the motel room she and AJ had shared. The floor was cement, and there was no light switch next to the door. She turned and tried to open the door, but a feeling in her gut told her it would be locked, and she was of course right. She hesitantly walked into the room.

The lights flashed on, and unlike the small lamps of the other room, these lights were the kind put in gymnasiums. The high power stuff. Blinded, Dash brought a fore leg up and let her eyes adjust. When they did, she almost jumped with fright. The Beast was tied to the floor, its gargantuan frame was in a laying position, its head strapped to the ceiling. The room was like a giant storeroom, without the shelves. Next to its right side was a medical tray. Taking a few careful steps towards the Beast, it began to shake and try to escape its bonds. Its moans became louder as she noticed two bulges under its skin.

The tray had a large assortment of scalpels on it. They were placed from largest to smallest. She took a closer look at the bumps on its side, and realized they were the same square shape as the indentation on the office door. She took in a deep breath, and gingerly picked up a medium sized scalpel in the cleft of her hoof. Her breathing was shallow, and she had to focus on what she was doing.

For a fleeting instant, she felt like Pinkie Pie, and she felt like retching. She fought back the urge and plunged the knife into the flesh between the two plates, pulling it down.

The Beast roared and shook, trying to bust its bonds.

"I'm sorry. I'll try to be quick." She found herself whispering to the monster. It made no response that she could understand. She placed the scalpel at the bottom of her first cut and quickly went right, and the first plate fell out with a clatter of metal on concrete. She placed the scalpel back at the initial cut and went left. A second plate fell and clattered.

Stooping down, she looked at them both. One read 'Remember' and was silver. The other read 'Forget' and was gold. She placed them both in her saddle bag. Without turning from the Beast, she backed away, and found the door had unlocked itself. Stepping out into the cold night air, she realized the radio hadn't gone off. Shrugging it off, she made her way up to the open motel room door on the second floor.

AJ wasn't in there. A whole in the wall revealed she had ripped two pipes from the plumbing. The skin mare monster was gone too. She returned to the office, but AJ wasn't there either. She was starting to get worried.

'There ya are!" The earth pony yelled as she came around the other corner of the office, two metal pipes hung from the straps of her vest. "Ya had me sick with worry. Runnin off like that. What were ya thinkin?" Dash chuckled and shrugged. She didn't want to talk about what she had just done.

"I found the key to the riddle?" She hoped that would relax the other pony.

"Really? How?"

"Oh, it was in another room on the first floor. No biggie, really." She took them out and placed them side by side in front of the door.

"Ah ain't very educated in poetry, but its the one that rhymes, right?" She picked up 'Forget' and placed it in the slot. The door clicked.

"Open Sesame." Dash said, pushing it open.

"Here." AJ pulled a pipe out and gave it to Dash. She placed it in her own strap. They nodded at each other and went in.

The Office was anything but. It was just a long corridor with another door at the end.

"This ain't an office. Ya figure they would jus say, 'hall to office'. Maybe the office is at the end?" AJ tried to make reason of a world that had none. Dash nodded again, and began to creep forward, being careful, just in case. After a minute of walking, and nothing exciting happening, Dash began to walk normally, like AJ had been doing all along. As they got closer to the door, the air seemed to become thick and oppressive. They both silently judged that something evil was on the other side of the door. They both pulled their pipes out as the reached it.

Dash looked at AJ, who nodded. Dash kicked the door open, rushed in, and stopped dead in her tracks.

Pinkie Pie lay on a perfect remake of the table Dash had been tied to two months ago...


	7. Salvation

Salvation

Pinkie Pie was blindfolded, and quietly calling for help. Her voice was hoarse, from obvious hours of screaming before that. Rainbow Dash made a beeline for the pony but felt a tug on her tail. Looking back, she could see the fury in Applejack's eyes. The earth pony had never forgiven Pinkie for what she had done to Dash. Dash on the other hand had read the journal of the pink pony, generally believing that that Pinkie had developed a second personality and was as helpless as her victims. AJ let go of her, to say something, but Dash shot out towards the table.

"Dash, get back here!" She yelled, and the pink ponies head shot towards them.

"Applejack? Rainbow Dash?" She meekly said.

"Pinkie, are you alright?" Dash said, trying to figure out how the straps worked, starting with her legs.

"No. You need to get out. You have to go right now." The party pony was serious, and sounded it too. Dash ignored her and continued to work the strap.

"There we go, first one done. Just give me a second and you'll be free." Dash moved to the other leg, and with a simple movement, had that one done as well, and than stood on her hind legs to undue the fore arm straps.

"Dash, what in tarnation do ya think your doin?" Applejack pulled her away from the table, and had to struggle to keep the Pegasus from rushing back to Pinkie. "This is the pony that did all those awful things to ya! You're just gonna set her free, jus like that?"

"AJ, she's the good side, can't you tell? Shes trying to protect us from herself, but maybe we can get her help. We can get our friend back."

"Oh, not this again. She ain't got no split personality. She's jus wrong in the head." AJ was shouting. Dash went lax in her front legs. She loosened her hold on the Pegasus. Than Dash bolted, easily avoiding AJ's flailing arms.

"No." Pinkie cut in. "Leave Dashie. Now." The wall on the far side of the room was suddenly dark. The over head lights were turning off like the sun going down, from one side to the other. Something stirred in the newly made darkness. Dash was straining to see and her flashlight was blinking in and out of functionality. She heard AJ shout in surprise, and something large moving in the darkness around her.

"AJ? You okay?" She was trying to shuffle her way to the source of the sound, bumping into an empty table-

Pinkie Pie was free. She had undone the last two straps herself. That meant...she had never been tied down. Dash felt stupid and lashed out at herself, but quickly stopped when the radio began to emit static loudly. The lights all came back on at once.

For the second time in an hour, Dash was blinded, but this time she tried to remain ready, choosing not to bring her arm up to shield her eyes. She could make out the shapes of a pony and the Beast standing side by side a few feet in front of her. She craned her head in every direction, finally finding another pony shape to her left, laying against the wall.

"What did you do to Applejack?" Dash felt her fury rising again. She fought to clear her head of the building anger.

"I gave her a paralytic. She'll be out for just a few minutes. Time enough for us to have fun, of course. Oh, Dashie, how I missed you. We never got to finish our last game. Ya know what they say Dashie, a job left unfinished is a mark on your record."

"Pinkie Pie. Why did you do what you did. And I mean everything, the numbers you talked about, the cannibalism you forced on us, and everypony else. Why?"

"Maybe its a secret. You know what that is right? After all, I only invite you to almost every party I ever threw. Even the surprise parties were thought out. So that the pony would never know, and couldn't feel left out of their own friendship circles. But you, you just did whatever to make the party work. You made me think you hated me. You avoided me and went around my back. You lied to my face, as blatantly as you could. I was forced to deal with a reality I had never considered. My mind did what it had to survive in a world it could not understand. The mind must never forget what the heart must never know. You have asked, " Did I cause this?" No Dashie. It wasn't you, at least not you alone. You are all to blame. But you were the only one's to come to this town. The only one to cling so painfully to the past, like a life line. But here, things work differently, here we are all forced to face the truth. Or die." The party pony was switching emotions from anger to joy every other sentence, becoming rather twitchy.

"So, it was our fault. Pinkie, I'm so sorr-"

"You are not sorry! You have not yet even begun to understand the pain I suffered! Do you know what its like to have another pony growing and living in your head? To feel it have its own bestial urges as it makes demands of you?" There was a long silence. Dash couldn't answer any of those questions. "Enough talk. It is time to finish our game. Beast, do what you were designed to do."

The Beast began to take its slow lumbering steps towards the meek Pegasus. She backed away as much as she could. She felt every fiber of her being willing her to run towards Applejack who was staring at them hazily. AJ had moved on from the incident. AJ was always disgusted with what Pinkie Pie had done, but she had already made up her own judgment and moved on.

Moved on.

Dash stopped moving. The Beast was getting closer. She stood defiantly up to it, her chest puffed out. She didn't flinch as it brought its massive leg into the air and launched her to the side with a mighty sweep. She landed next to AJ, rolling from the fall to lay sprawled next to her. She sputtered for a moment, quickly catching her breath from her impact with the wall.

"Hey Applejack. I need you to know something. I've been so scared around you. I was worried that my fear of the past would eventually push you away from me. That you would regret playing nurse for me. Maybe that would come true. But I need you know. I love you. Thank you for coming here with me. Even with all the pain and suffering, thank you." She placed a peck on AJ's cheek before pushing herself up. Beast was only a step or two away.

"Come on, Beast. Do your worst. I sure as hay don't expect to live past today." She took a shaky step towards it. "I clung to the past with fear of losing someone who meant so much to me. I tried to convince myself that if I moved on, I would forget Pinkie Pie. I would forget someone who made me, me. But I'm over that. I don't forgive you Pinkie Pie. I forget you." Beast had moved to crush her, stopping just as she finished. Its leg slowly swung back to rest with the others. Pinkie yelled for it to continue, but it took no notice of her yells.

"I can't forgive you Pinkie Pie. You hurt people you cared about, and who cared about you, so badly. We hurt you. And you hurt us. I don't want to let you go, I want to remember all the laughs we shared. But those memories are muddled by the terror you brought on to me. Pinkie Pie. Your a stranger to me. The pony I knew, loved her friends. And she would never hurt them. You have forsaken that idea. And that was what made Pinkie Pie, Pinkie Pie. And if your not Pinkie Pie, than your a stranger. And I don't have to be loyal to strangers! Now. Get. Out. Of. My. Life!" Her scream seemed to have an effect on both Pinkie Pie and Beast.

Beast fell onto his side, and his entire body began to fade away into a large pile of ash. If it felt pain, it made no sign, merely staring blankly at Dash. Pinkie Pie began to cry loudly, falling back onto her haunches as she too faded into dust.

"Goodbye, Pinkie Pie." Dash quietly said to herself. After staring at the pile for a short time, she moved next to AJ, who was still in her paralytic state. "Hey, you okay?" She knew the earth pony couldn't respond but she wanted her to be comfortable. She laid down next to her.

"I don't know how you feel about what I said. I just want to sit a little while with you, until you feel better, and than we can get out of here. I made up my mind back when we were in the motel that if after all this, if you...lost the feelings you had for me, I would do my best to understand but I would always want to be your friend." She lay in silence, her eyelids became heavy, and as she struggled to keep them open she felt a soft and warm nuzzle against her neck.

"Dash." Was all she heard before she passed out.

Dash woke up in the motel room, her head pounding from a terrible migraine. Probably didn't help that she had bolted straight up when she awoke. She fell back, offending her head even more. She tried to stay as still as possible, and had to resist getting up when she heard the door to the motel opening.

"Dash, ya awake yet?" It was Applejack.

She did her best to mumble something in reply. She heard the earth pony rush over, and stand on Dash's right.

"Mornin' sugarcube, how ya feelin?" Dash did her best to smile, and AJ leaned down and placed her lips squarely on Dash's, who's head was revolted against the sudden pressure, but she also felt herself blush deeply as AJ leaned over her.

"Ah get what you said back with Pinkie. Ah understand what ya were so worried about. I want you to know that I want to stand by your side for the rest of my days. Ya were so brave standin up to the terrors of your past. Ta be honest, Ah don't know if ah could do what ya did." AJ smiled, crawling onto the bed, laying next to Dash.

"Thank you AJ. Though, to be honest, I felt like I had a pretty good chance that you would feel that way. Most ponies would, so you don't have to be embarrassed." Dash was trying to pretend to be as proud as she could be. AJ gave her light shove, causing another spike of pain in her head, to which her hoof shot up to deal with.

"Migraine? Ah had one too when Ah came to. It'll go away. So...It's over? Yer...okay?"

Dash smiled, gladly taking the pain as she pushed herself closer to Applejack, placing her head on her shoulder. "I think, today is the start of a brand new era."

"Should weh tell Twilight when weh get back?"

"No, I think this tale should remain between you and me." They both smiled. They enjoyed the rest of their vacation, and when it came time to return home, neither could say they would miss the town shrouded in fog...


	8. Alteranate

A Change of Pace

Conditions: Leave the pony in the box to suffer, the train would move on its own after leaving the conductors car. Insert the 'Remember' placard, even if it ruins the rhyme.

...Pinkie Pie was free. She had undone the last two straps herself. That meant...she had never been tied down. Dash felt stupid and lashed out at herself, but quickly stopped when the radio began to emit static loudly. The lights all came back on at once.

For the second time in an hour, Dash was blinded, but this time she tried to remain ready, choosing not to bring her arm up to shield her eyes. She could make out the shapes of a pony and the Beast standing side by side a few feet in front of her. She craned her head in every direction, finally finding another pony shape to her left, laying against the wall.

"What did you do to Applejack?" Dash felt her fury rising again. She fought to clear her head of the building anger.

"I gave her a paralytic. She'll be out for just a few minutes. Time enough for us to have fun, of course. Oh, Dashie, how I missed you. We never got to finish our last game. Ya know what they say Dashie, a job left unfinished is a mark on your record."

Dash could feel the fury building in the back of her mind. Like a seething cauldron of oil, the maddening anger became like a hot stick in the back of her eyes, yearning for freedom.

"Why did you...why did..." She tried to speak, but felt dizzy, her chest was tight, and the wingless nubs on her back began to ache. She stumbled forward, almost falling on her side.

"If you want to ask a question Dashie, you have to speak up." Pinkie Pie mocked her, calling out in a sing song tune. Dash felt her mind drifting away, the corners of her vision becoming a glaring white.

"Oh, how sad. I was hoping for some kind of big reveal where you would have to face the truth. You would have to understand when to call it quits, even with your most vital personality traits. But I guess we will have to skip that pleasantry. Time to die, Dashie."

The Beast took a lumbering step forward. Dash took no notice of him, instead trying to remain standing while her head bobbed with each breath, which came in small gasps. She could feel her entire body aching, it felt like her very soul was dying. The Beast brought its leg up, ready to sweep across her.

'Give in.' She though to herself, without thinking to herself. There was another voice, her own, a strange sense of hatred and fear rising in its voice. 'You didn't deserve what she did to you. Just a little mistake, and now your life is ruined? Where is the equality in that? Give in to the anger. The rage. The hatred. Give into the fog, get lost in it. Become one with it.' Maybe she was going mad, but the voice made a strange sense of logic. She gave in to the voice, and felt a strange sense of both pleasure and rage wash over her.

She shot forward, nimbly dodging The Beasts leg, and weaving in between its other legs. It began the slow process of turning about. Dash made a beeline for the pink party pony, who was more than content to watch the show from the sidelines. The sudden change in the pace of the fight caught her off guard, and she was unable to move fast enough to avoid Dash. Pinkie Pie managed to get two steps away before Dash caught he by the tail.

Pinkie began to turn around when a hoof caught her in the left cheek, throwing her to the side. Laying on her side, she tried to bring her head up to see Dash, who brought a hoof down and smashed Pinkies head into the hard concrete. Dash brought both of her hooves down, clamping around the pink ponies throat.

Rainbow Dash gave into her hatred, feeling her hooves press down on the party ponies throat. She pushed down with all her might, watching the pink pony began to squeak and gasp for air.

Pinkie had the front row seat to watching a soul die. Dash was slowly fading color. The light blue began to fade to a light gray, eyes once magenta now turned a vibrant brown. The rainbow colored mane began to glow a weak orange. It was strange, it felt like Pinkie Pie was looking into a mirror that was color blind. Two ponies without souls anymore.

"This is all your fault, Pinkie Pie. You left me with these memories to claw away at my sanity and happiness. You taught me how to hate, how to seek revenge. And now, we're gonna finish the game you started, but this time, this time, you get to be the toy. You get to suffer," Pinkie Pie had started to choke out, her eyes closing when Dash pushed down in a jerking motion to keep the pink pony awake for a moment longer, " And remember, wherever you end up after this, no one will ever remember you for the happiness you once brought them. Die."

Pinkie Pie closed her eyes. The pain in her chest released, and after a few seconds, so did Dash's hooves. The lights above began to burn brightly, like a series of suns. Dash passed out on a pile of dust.

When Dash came to, Applejack was trying to wake her. The earth ponies face was eschewed in a look of confusion and terror. She had watched as Dash killed Pinkie Pie, while the strange Beast had watched on it a perplexing manner. Applejack pushed Dash's shoulder lightly with a hoof. Dash knocked the hoof away. A hurt look crept across the earth ponies face.

Dash ignored it, shakily standing up. "Dash, are ya okay?" AJ tried to place a hoof on Dash's shoulder, who just shrugged it off. "What is the matter with ya, Rainbow Dash?"

Dash observed the empty storage room they were in, before turning away from AJ to find the door they had used to come in. She took a few shaky steps as the earth pony watched.

"That's not my name. Not anymore." She said, not even bothering to look at AJ as she spoke.

"What are ya talkin about?"

"Thunder Clash." She said blatantly, pointing at her cutie mark. The cloud was the same, but the lightning bolt was now a dull yellow, instead of the proud rainbow it had once been. "The pony you knew is gone. They had to sacrifice themselves to live on. That mind had to destroy itself, lest its heart learn the secrets that would have destroyed the pony entirely. So, I'm not Rainbow Dash. I'm Thunder Clash. And before you ask, its over. Whatever you had with her, it doesn't carry on."

"Now wait just a second! Ya aren't makin any sense!" AJ rushed in front of Thunder Clash.

"Look, Rainbow Dash let this town do its job. She fed it, allowed the nightmare to creep into her, turning her fear and pain into hatred. And she gave into it. She let herself become a part of this town. Just one soul among thousands. And everypony else that will come here, with each blow to each monster, they will torment her soul as well. Until it to cries out for the pain and misery of the living. Now move. I have no intention of living my life here." Thunder moved around AJ, and let herself out. AJ held in her pain for months, than years, than decades. She went home, finding it impossible to tell Twilight about the horror in the town, why she came back alone, why she cried uncontrollably when it rained, or a rainbow was out. Why she was emotionally numb. Why she consistently received pamphlets for the Town of Silent Mane.

She was never able to get that rainbow maned pony out of her mind...

Ending theme song: Hurt, the cover by Johnny Cash.


	9. The Town That Never Was

The Town That Never Was

Rainbow Dash was sitting stark still, her face buried into the pane of glass before her. Her face was blank, no emotion. He nose was touching the glass, and each time she exhaled, she fogged the window around her mouth. The courtyard before her was empty, not because of the thick blanket of snow that covered the asphalt yard, but because the patients had been rowdy the day before, and outside privileges were suspended.

Rainbow brought a hoof up to her jacket, a tight fitting white coat with straps and buckles on the chest and side. The most annoying part of the jacket was the one she was scratching, the tight metal banded sleeve for her wings. She touched them, and pulled her hoof away. She had scratched through the thin materiel again, and had scratched her skin raw enough to bleed. She sat in her wooden chair, waiting for one of the nurses to see her injuries and force her back into the nurses office. Absentmindedly, she looked back at they yard and felt her jaw drop an inch. It would have fallen further, but the muzzle she was forced to wear restrained such an action.

In the courtyard, looking up, through the window were two ponies. One was wearing a brown cowpony hat, and festive green sweater. The other was pink. Rainbows mind raced, her entire body felt like it was on fire as she began to squirm and scream frantically. She could hear movement behind her, and a set of hooves gently wrapped around her shoulders. She knew it was Nurse Kind Stone, but she squirmed any way, screaming all the while.

"Calm down, Rainbow. Its going to be okay, just calm down." Rainbow could feel a soft needle prick in her neck. Something warm rushed into her veins, and she felt like her body was going numb, but without the pain. She licked her lips and smacked them lazily as she succumbed to the effects of the medicine. One of the orderlies took possession of her, lifting her in his strong fore legs, and placing her on a wheel chair.

The facility was well built, the walls a beautiful blue, with clouds painted on them. The halls seemed to last forever, but in her care free state, Rainbow didn't even realize that the orderly had already brought her to a family meeting room. There was a small, wooden table in the center of the room, and the room itself was bare. Even the walls were white. Rainbow could feel the orderly pinning her front legs to the side of her jacket, crossing her left leg over the right.

He stepped out and closed the door. Rainbow looked at the door on the far side of the room, and could feel, even through the drug coursing through her system, tension rising. The door clicked, and she held her breath. Applejack came in first, the apple pony wearing a fake smile. They didn't enjoy coming to see Rainbow anymore, not after what happened last time. Pinkie Pie came in next, her left cheek still had a small valley where Rainbow had tried to rip out her entire cheek with one bite. AJ, Twilight, Rarity, and Fluttershy had been there, and all four of them had to struggle to pull the maddened Pegasus off of Pinkie.

"Hey, Rainbow." AJ started, sitting to her right, on the opposite side of the wooden table. Rainbow didn't acknowledge her, staring with wide, terror filled eyes at Pinkie Pie, who tried to avoid as much eye contact as possible. Pinkie would occasionally feel the burning sensation of Rainbow's never ending stare, and would look up, only to look away a second later, her eyes darting away.

"They wouldn't let us bring a cake in, but, we came for yer birthday. Happy Birthday Dash. Uh, Rarity an' Twilight said they would stop by later, but they were a little caught up with...other things." AJ gave Pinkie Pie a weak smile, and Pinkie Pie, the happiest of their small collection of friends, couldn't return it.

"Happy Bitrh-" was as far as the pink party pony could get before Rainbow began to surge forward, then back, her back legs flailing at the table, her mouth couldn't make noise still, but her eyes were a steady stream of tears, as the false memories of Pinkie abusing her, and the town in the fog, flashed through her minds eyes. The orderly rushed in, commanding the two to leave, and pulling Rainbow in the hallway, where Nurse Kind Stone was waiting with a another shot.

Nurse Kind Stone sat in the observation booth, her white coat and mane still a mess from the struggle of trying to subdue the now sleeping Rainbow Dash. The Pegasus was in her small living quarters, sound asleep and buckled down to her bed. Even from the distance of ten feet, Kind Stone could see the blue Pegasus' lips quickly moving. An orderly walked in, a cup of coffee held in the magic field of his horn.

"Whats she talking about?" He asked, placing the cup down on the small work table just underneath the window of the observation room.

"She dreaming of her friend Pinkie Pie knocking her out, torturing her, and then she gets rescued by another friend, Applejack and they fall in love, and they go to the town of Silent Mane, and fight monsters, dealing with the horror that Rainbow Dash went through at the hands of their friend, Pinkie." She said in one breath of air, sipping from the coffee. She said it so bluntly and expressionlessly that it showed just how mundane talking about it had become.

"Huh." Was all the orderly said before turning and leaving.

Rainbow Dash would dream of a town in the fog, where monsters prowled and the truth lurked, for the rest of her life...


	10. Of Nightmares

The winter sun beat uselessly against the window, it provided no warmth, making the interior of the quaint cottage only a few degree's warmer than the air outside. The cold beams of light from the bathroom window had done little to discourage a young filly from running and taking a hot bubble bath. The filly was a pearlescent white unicorn, with a royal purple mane that was set in two large curls, one to the right of her face, and one at the end of her mane, hanging down her left shoulder. Her name was Rarity.

Her head was the only thing visible above the bubbly surface, and she was gently blowing the bubbles away from her face, giggling gleefully as she did so. With a short nod of her head,a weak light began to glow from her horn, and a rather large amount of concentration, she formed a small mound of bubbles into a stallion, large and strong in her imagination.

Allowing the bubbles to pop slowly, she reclined in the tub, resting her head on the lip of the white porcelain. The sudden jiggling of the door handle a few feet away caused her to bolt upright.

"Occcuuupppied." She called in a sing song voice. Whoever was at the door continued to attempt to enter. Rarity let out a loud sigh, "Who is it?"

No one answered and the the handle stopped. "How rude." Rarity said to herself, reclining back into the water, sinking down into it. As she lay underwater, letting the water soak her hair, the door creaked open. Through the bubbles, Rarity could make out the form of somepony standing above her. A hoof broke the surface, catching her in the chest, and forcing her down. She felt the tub hit against the back of her head, and the hoof on her chest knocked the wind out of her. Through the splashing and foolish attempt to scream underwater, she couldn't make out her attacker.

She slipped into unconsciousness.

And woke up in her queen sized bed. Her purple mane was a mess, and she was covered in a dry sweat, and her breathing was short and shallow. She reached out for her lamp, quickly turning it on before her bright blue eyes could adjust to the darkness of her bedroom. With the light on, her eyes met with the small black eyes of her Persian cat, Opalescence.

"Oh Opal, mommy just had that terrible nightmare. Again." She ran a hoof absentmindedly over the cats back, trying to count the number of times she had had that nightmare. She decided seven times this month was a good estimate. Her horn began to glow as she levitated a small book and a quill from somewhere out of the darkness of her room.

She opened the book and began to write on a blank page.

'Dearest Diary,

It seems that every time I close my eyes, I have the same dream over and over again. The one where I'm in the bath, trying to relax on a cold winter day, when somepony barges in and attempts to drown me. And quite frankly, I've put up with it long enough! I'm going to see Twilight tomorrow and ask her for some help. Maybe she'll have a book about dreams.'

She was set to start another line about Twilight's measurements, and how she needed to retake them since Twilight had lost a few pounds the past month, when the faint sound of hoofsteps outside her bedroom door drew her attention. Opalescence was still at the foot of the bed, and the only other pony in the house was Sweetie Bell, Rarity's younger sister. Rarity threw her covers off of herself, and poked her head out into the hall. Her home, and place of business, the Carousel Boutique, was based on the design of a carousel. It was a round building , with the upper inner ring being smaller that the lower wider ring.

"Sweetie Bell, are you okay?" She called, and since the young filly slept in the very next room, she didn't have to call too loudly. No response came, and the sound of hooves could be heard going down the wooden stairs. Maybe the filly was hungry or thirsty and going to get something from the kitchen. Rarity followed the sound, going down to the lower level, and seeing immediately to her left that the light of the kitchen was on.

"Sweetie Bell?" Rarity called, walking into the spacious kitchen. It was empty, the only thing out of place was a knife on the counter top along the right hoof wall. She picked it up wit her horn, and was placing it neatly back in the drawer it belonged to when she head the sound of a pony going up the stairs and out the front door, simultaneously.

"Who's there?" She nervously cried out. Again, no reply came. She lifted the knife back up into the air, and began to tip toe to the doorless entry of the kitchen. Looking left of the entrance, she could see the front door was ajar, a weak breeze drafting in. She closed it with her magic and began to make her way back upstairs. She glanced over her shoulder, stopping half way up, staring into the dark abyss below her. Looking back upstairs, a pony had taken up a perch at the landing. It was too large to be Sweetie Bell, its front legs were thick and bulging, and it let out short, bellowing breaths. That was all she could see through the dark veil, even as it took a single step downward.

She willed her legs to take a step back, or turn around, but they felt as heavy as cement. Something in her mind raced to find a meaning behind the existence of the pony, like it was a beast misplaced from time and space. It skipped a step and was rearing back, a grotesque scent filled the air, like a cigar's smoke mixed with burnt flesh. The blow caught her in the left shoulder, spinning her slightly as she tumbled down the stairs, landing sideways on the carpet. She felt her head swimming, and her vision of the monster on the stairs began to blur into four or five different sets. She shook off the drowsiness and clumsily began to run.

She hit a table, a chair and a lamp on her way to the door, blinded by fear and the dark. She opened the door as she neared it, and slammed it shut as she ran out. The outside world was different to say the least. The air was filled with the smell of rain and smoke. The path from her house was the only lit part of town, and the entire town of Ponyville seemed to have disappeared. The path from her house no longer ran to the towns main road, but winded for as far as she could see.

In the distance, right where what little light she could see met the darkness, she could make out a small white pony with a light purple and light pink mane.

"Sweetie Bell! Come back her this instant" She called, running down the narrow cobble road. The road seemed to stretch for forever, winding and winding through some invisible route. Rarity had slowed her gallop after only a good twenty minutes, as she felt her chest heave from a lack of oxygen. She walked on at a slow pace, trying to catch up with Sweetie Bell.

Suddenly, the path stopped. In front of her was a rectangular wooden sign that read in bold white letters : Silent Mane. Rarity looked over her shoulder, to see that the path behind her had vanished. Looking forward again, she was instantly met with a blow from the large legged pony, still shrouded in darkness.

It struck her in the chest, knocking her into consciousness.

Rarity woke up, the sun was beaming through her window. Just another dream...


	11. Traveling

Travel Time Varies

Rarity spent the day after the nightmare wandering the width and breadth of Ponyville, searching for her sister. Sweetie Bell had disappeared off the face of the earth it would seem. In the evening she had set up a trip to Silent Mane, making sure to have a carriage arrive early enough that she could leave long before anypony else would be awake.

Rarity had dressed in a simple red fly sheet, with a wide brimmed hat of matching crimson, which had proven to be a brilliant idea. The carriage was a simple taxi cart, recolored a blue veneer, with the words 'Careful Carriage' written on the side in a stylish, cursive tan. She rode in silence, shifting every now and again, yet she managed to miss out on the beautiful countryside around her for her mind was in the now faraway Ponyville. She felt a little bad that she had chosen to not tell her friends where she was going, having prepared a small note on the front door of her boutique that said she was taking a short vacation. But even as she thought of them, her mind drifted to Sweetie Bell. She could only hope the filly was okay.

"Were almost there, miss." The driver, a scruffy, large, brown stallion called back to her, his voice hoarse from dry throat.

"Thank you." Rarity said absentmindedly, trying to dispel the thought of Sweetie Bell lost in the town somewhere, scared and alone, hungry and tired. She was forced from her thoughts as the carriage buckled forward unexpectedly. The driver muttered a curse under his breath, pulling his leg free from a broken wheel axle. It had a series of minor cuts from the thigh to the hoof.

"Are you alright, sir?" Rarity let herself off of the now ground level side of the carriage. He seemed to distracted with the damage of his cart to respond. She levitated her fly sheet from her back and loosely tied it to his leg, even as he tried to assess the damage to his vehicle.

"Hmm? Oh, thanks a ton, little miss." He faced her now, limping on his leg a little. "Sorry about this. I can't even figure what done it. Not a hole or rock on this road. Maybe you should get off to town, I'll catch up with your stuff."

Rarity felt a little skeptical leaving her bag in the possession of a stranger, but she had more pressing matters than a bag. "I'm staying at the Hotel Mane. Just be careful not to hurt yourself any more then you already are."

He smiled, turning back to his cart as she ditched her hat, leaving it with the pinkish saddle bag still on the cart. She began to make her way to town, moving at a brisk pace. It wasn't long before a thin layer of fog was closing in around her. The hills and distant lake were gone. As she kept on, knowing that only the singular dirt path would lead her to her destination, the fog became thick, to the point she could scarcely see five to six feet before her.

She stopped and listened. She could have sworn to have heard something moving around in the fog. The sound of a hoof landing to her right.

"Who's there?" She called, facing the gray wall of air before her. "This isn't funny. Just come out!" No reply. A hoof beat the ground savagely behind her. She spun, feeling her heart jump a beat.

The pony with the large fore legs was making its way towards her, just a silhouette in the mist. She spun back towards the supposed direction of the town and began to gallop. Every single muscle in her body repulsed the sudden movement, and she nearly tripped twice along the dirt path. She slowed only when her hooves met the cobbled roads of civilization.

The town was just as foggy as the area outside of town. No lights were on to help see through the fog, but she could make out a large wooden sign to her right. Without looking she knew what it said. She was in Silent Mane. The town in her nightmare. Under the sign was a large plastic envelope, which contained a map of the community. She was on main street, which was where the police station, hospital and a few restaurants were.

She breathed deeply, and set out, heading for the police station first. Hoping that someone would be there to put out a call to look out for a filly. The road to the station was straight, and she followed the map as best she could, but she relied on the sidewalk to help her navigate. Turns out, it didn't matter. She crossed in front of a Grocery Store and slowed to a stop as she found a tall barricade of steel blocking her path. It stretched from one side of the road to the other. She began to consider other ways around, and cast a short glance in the direction of the grocery store.

The grocery store had a single light on in it, but aside from that it looked dark in there. According to her map, the store and the police station shared an alley, so if she could get there, she could get to the station. She sluggishly made her way into the dark store, pushing open the glass framed door slowly. Inside, ten registers were in a neat row to her left and right. Just as many aisles filled the store. The light she had seen outside was coming from the third aisle on her left, and she tip toed to the aisles opening.

Peeking around the corner of the aisle, she could make out canned goods and beverages. The light was on a lower shelf, surrounded by soda. She retched as she got closer, a repugnant smell wafted from the light. Or, as she realized, the severed leg that was holding it in the cleft of its hoof. She had to turn away and breath deeply, letting out shuddering sighs. She found her courage, turned back to the light and picked it up, feeling the leg still try to cling to it, and it slid down as she pulled it from the dead grip.

The leg made a wet sound as it fell to the linoleum floor. She threw up, all over the linoleum floor. After regaining her composure, she mad her way to the back of the store. As she exited the aisle, she heard the sound of a distant phone ringing, sounding as if it was coming from the front of the store. She galloped back down the aisle, and found the ringing was coming from the front register with the large plastic 3 sign. She picked up the receiver with her cleft and held it to her ear.

"Hello?" She squeaked out.  
"Mareissa? Its Coltan. She had another accident." He paused, as if expecting a reply, than continued his ghost conversation, "Yeah. Hit her head in the tub, I'm gonna take her to the hospital. I'll see you at home? Alright. Bye." The dial tone set in.

She placed the phone back, and gave it a long stare. Her parents were named Mareissa and Coltan. She turned and headed for the back of the store again, levitating the flashlight so she could through the darkness. As she approached the wide double doors of the stocking section of the store, she saw a green billboard that read 'Employee of the Month', to the right of the door, past a window. All of the pictures were of a small geeky stallion. To the left of that, was the glass window of the Managers office, which seemed to run from the grocery side of the store to the storage room side. From the corner of the window, a small white filly, with curled light pink and light purple hair, stared at her with green eyes.

Rarity jumped back, surprised by the sudden appearance, but immediately shot forward realizing who it was.

"Sweetie Bell!" She called, but the filly only turned and ran to the left. The door to leave the managers office was on the stocking room side. Rarity gave chase, opening the wide double doors as she ran through them.

She stopped in an instant. She had walked into a new kind of darkness that could have passed for Hell...


	12. Gearing UP

Rain

The stocking room was brighter than the store front, and Rarity no longer needed the flashlight to see. Yet, she held it in the air, her mouth agape. The tall metal shelves that had no doubt once been aisles in the room, but now they were pushed to the sides, forming barricades on either side of the large room. In the center, a mare, coated in bandages, casts, and a hospital gown, gripped what looked like a blood soaked filly in her mouth. The fillies only movement was whatever shaking movement the mares head made.

Rarity felt herself die on the inside. She had failed to protect her sister. In an instant, she felt shame in herself, hatred for the beast before her, and a deep sense of pity for the filly. It must have been a brutal, if not quick and terror filled, death. Against all reason, she let out an insignificant peep, the noise that came just before a sob. The mare stopped, and began to crane its head towards her. Rarity couldn't make out any facial features on the mare, a large set of loosely applied bandages hung from its head. Two holes were cut for the eyes, but they were too small to see the iris color.

The mare stared for a hard second or two, before it allowed the limp body in its mouth to fall out of its mouth with a sickeningly wet thud on the hard concrete. The mare wasn't as clumsy as the large legged stallions, moving with an elegance and grace that made it seem more monster than pony. It galloped at her, swinging its head to one side to reveal a long set of medical blades stuck into the side of half a neck cast. It swung wildly as it approached, attempting to gouge her in the neck or head.

Rarity felt panic creep into her. Something burned in the back of her mind, as if the thing attacking her wasn't real. It was, of course, and the feeling went away as the injured mare monster cut into the crest of her neck. Rarity threw herself to the side, hoping to get enough distance to effect an actual escape. The flashlight clattered loudly to the ground as she released it from her telepathic grip. As she rolled away from the mare, she noticed a slick trail of red dots were forming behind her. The gash across her neck wasn't deep.

She pushed her self against a wall, and felt it give way. She tumbled onto her side realizing she was in the managers office. Looking up, the mare was at the doorway, and abruptly stopped as Rarity slammed the door closed, hitting it in the process. The mare slammed against the door, letting out low guttural roars as it went. Rarity had to push against the door with her entire body to keep it from forcing its way in. The blows began to soften as a siren began to wail in the distance, a long air raid siren. The mare stopped entirely, and began to make a soundless retreat. Rarity held her breath as she allowed the door to creak open slowly.

She thrust her head out into the stocking room, and looked about. It was empty, save for the small body, laying limp in a puddle of blood. Keeping her head low, she moved as quiet as a mouse to the body. She gave the corpse a gentle nuzzle, and had to hold back a sob when as she felt the cold corpse.

"Oh Sweetie Bell." She cooed, "Why?" She gave into the emotions and began to wail and sob uncontrollably. She felt her chest heave as she tried to regain control of her breath. After finding her breath, she felt another sob squeezing its way through her throat. Something in the rafter above began to loudly clang as it fell through the rafters, causing the dawning wail to die out. A small gray radio clattered to the ground, miraculously surviving the fall. It sputtered white noise loudly.

Wiping a tear from her eyes, Rarity crept up to the radio. As she picked it up with the cleft of her hoof, the white noise stopped. A voice, young and in a sing song tone, came over the sound waves.

"Twinkle, twinkle little star,

They were careful not to scar.

When the blazing sun is gone,

When the nothing shines upon.

Than you show your little light,

And pray for something bright.

Than the traveler in the dark,

Thanks you for your little spark.

He could not see which way to go,

If you did not twinkle so.

He will know where you are,

If you twinkle like a star."

The voice was definitely Sweetie Bells, and it was filled with the cracking of her voice that Rarity knew was how the filly responded to being afraid. She looked at the corpse. She couldn't prove that it was or wasn't Sweetie Bell. A realization crept over , and she felt like an idiot. The horn.

She gracefully rolled the body over, and pushed the clumped, blood soaked hair away from the forehead.

No unicorn horn.

Sweetie Bell was alive somewhere.

Rarity left the radio where it was for the moment, and began to head back into the managers office. The room was spacious, with a small wooden desk at the far end, a locker on her left side, and a TV and stand on her right, just past the window. Rarity checked the desk first, but found that the lock was broken, and none of the drawers would even budge. On the top of the desk was a memo, declaring that a child was apprehended with a knife. Under the paper was a manilla envelope that contained the knife. It was better than nothing, Rarity thought to herself. But now she had three things to carry, the knife, flashlight and radio.

The locker was next, the top rack of its inside held only a white shirt, which was far to large for Rarity to wear. The coat rack that made up the majority of the locker held a tan long sleeve jacket, complete with a mid line belt. Rarity pulled it on to find it a perfect fit. The shoulder lapels would be perfect to hold her flashlight and radio, and the pockets had more than enough room for the knife and other items.

She slid the knife into the lowest chest pocket, and strapped the flashlight in. She didn't care much to check the TV, and headed back into the stocking room. The radio was still quiet. She placed it in the left shoulder lapel.

Now she just needed to find the alley exit. She began to pace the room, following the walls. On the east side of the room was a door coated in years of rust. Instead of checking it immediately, she continued down the wall, finding another door, made of wood with a silver handle. The lock was broken off inside the handle of the nice door.

"Of course, the nice one had to be broken." She sighed to herself. As she headed back to the rusty door, she caught sight of the mutilated filly corpse. She felt horrible. She hadn't even tried to give it some kind of send off.

She rolled it on to its back, laying its hooves across its chest. She closed its bloodshot and colorless eyes. "I've never been to a funeral before. I...don't know what to say exactly, I didn't know you. I do know that no pony deserves what happened to you. I'm sorry." She couldn't think of anything else to say to the body. She placed the white shirt from the managers office over the corpse. With beaten shoulders she walked to the rusted door, pushed it open and stepped into a darkened hallway with photos of a happy family adorning the walls. She was in someponies home. She pulled her map out, to find she was in the homes directly on the other side of the street, and the other side of the steel wall. They were the only homes even remotely close to the grocery store. But it made no sense for her to have made such a jump in distance.

A loud moan came from the hall up ahead, pulling her attention away from the map. The rust covered door slammed shut behind her, and wouldn't budge.

She would have to fight...


	13. Hold Your Breath

Hold Your Breath

The moan came not from a monster, at least not one of that world. The stallion that tumbled down the hall was white, with a grime covered tuxedo on. His blond hair was a tattered mess, slick with dried blood and dust. His name was Prince Blueblood, and he rushed past Rarity, forcing her against one wall. She let out a loud yelp, but he ignored her. He let out a deflated sigh.

Something in the darkness moaned again.

"You!" he pointed at her, "I need to be protected. There's a monster out there!"

Before Rarity could argue, one of the large legged stallions emerged from the darkness. The darkness acted as a barrier from what it looked like, the way the stallion had been entirely invisible behind it. It was a strange looking beast, its skin was soggy, and it left small puddles wherever it stepped. Along its fore legs were long, thin blue and purple bruises. Its head lolled lazily from side to side, yet it always kept an eye one her.

For a moment, Rarity thought that maybe Blueblood had defended himself from it, but that thought was quickly dismissed by the sound of his constant whimpering. She used her telekinesis to lift the knife from her pocket, and held it in font of her. She could only strike out so far with it before she would lose the power necessary to do damage. If she were a more magical unicorn like Twilight, she would have been able to strike at further distances.

As the thing got closer, she felt her panic rising, and brought the knife into a stabbing position. She struck out with the knife, aiming squarely for the chest, and hit with the sound of a knife stabbing into rotten fruit.

"Twist it! Twist it!" Blueblood screamed in her ears, pushing her forward and at the monster. She almost tripped, but managed to find her balance directly in front of it. It brought its right leg up, and she did as Blueblood instructed, twisting the knife as she pulled it free. Water began to rush out of its chest, and it began to deflate. It brought its leg down in a sweeping motion, pushing her into the wall. The blow itself stung, if only for a moment as the thing lost its momentum from its deflating chest, but the monster kept her pinned, trying to crush her. The force behind the leg was immensely strong, it felt like an anvil on the ribs. She could feel her strength slowly seep out as it crushed her. Blueblood merely watched in perplexed shock.

She tried to stab the knife into its leg with downward strokes, but the first two hits slid off the wet skin, leaving fine gash's in the flesh. The third hit connected, landing in the center of the leg. She felt the monster begin to push even harder, as if it knew of the danger she now poised towards it. She felt her grip on the blade slipping, yet she continued to try and turn it in its skin. She felt the pressure on her chest intensify.

Mustering her strength, she forced the knife to do a full 360 degree spin, before pulling it out. The leg began to deflate, and the monster fell onto its side, using its still good leg as a shield. She used the time to catch her breath and shakily step back from it. It was wheezing, and making the gesture that it would hit her if she moved anywhere near it. Watching the sagging chest and arm, she realized they were slowly filling back up, and it would be fully healed in only a minute or two.

She moved just out of the reach of its arm, and held the knife over its unwounded arm. It didn't feel right to kill it, but it would it hesitate to do the same to her?

"Finish it! Don't just watch it heal." Blueblood shouted, still firmly pressed against the rusted door. She shot him a glare, but he was watching the monster and ignored it. She finally plunged the knife down into the moist meat of its remaining front leg, and twisted. The knife didn't get stuck and the monster seemed to notice it was now defenseless, its head began to shake violently, and made a weak neighing sound.

She felt some pity for it. Like it was afraid to die.

Blueblood felt no such pity, choosing to rush past Rarity, and stomp down on the things head. He hit once, and it began to bleed from the eyes, and on the second stomp its head crushed like like a watermelon. He was breathing heavily when he turned to face her, looking over his shoulder. His eyes were wild, looking at her. Looking all over her.

"Prince?" She asked, hearing the hesitation in her own voice. He smiled back at her. "Are you feeling well, Prince Blueblood?"

"You seem familiar. Have we met before?" He turned towards her, moving to block the hallway.

"I would say that we have. I am Rarity, from the Grand Galloping Gala." She forced a smile as the anger from that night began to resurface in her mind. He had technically killed her dream of finding a Prince at the Gala, but repressed saying anything.

"Ah. Yes. I think I remember you now. Where are my manners? Would you like an escort through these strange and dangerous halls?" His smile widened, and he moved closer, till he was standing over her. She felt her smile was showing how awkward she felt. He didn't seem to notice and answered for her.

"Of course you do. Lets go. I know the way out, of course." His smile made something in her stomach churn.

"If you know the way, than I suppose it would be best for me to follow you." She intended to ditch him first chance she got. He began to lead the way, stepping on the body of the monster. He didn't seem to care that his hooves were coated in that strange water. Rarity walked around it, giving it as much space as she could manage. The hall opened up into the living room of a house. There was a couch on the left, a small nightstand next to it, a coffee table in front of it, a door leading to a kitchen on the far wall, and stairs going down next to the door.

The always useful Prince Blueblood pointed at the couch. "Would you be a doll and make that a little cleaner? I would like a place to sit for a moment. The shock of what just happened is settling in still." He pleaded, and gave a weak lip quiver. Rarity stared at him in disbelief, and had to close her mouth after a moment or two.

"I beg your pardon? I am not your maid, Prince Blueblood!" She was furious, she felt all the blood rush to her face, and she was in a fighting position, her head low to the ground. He merely made a 'humph' sound and sat on the couch anyway.

"Then I guess you get to figure out how to get out of here on your own."

"I will. And when I do, you can stay here on your little couch!" She seethed, walking into the kitchen. The kitchen smelt like something had crawled into it long ago, and died. It was small and quaint otherwise, with fully lined wall cabinets, separated by a fridge and a stove. There were no other doors in the room. The light didn't work either, but it was a small enough room that the flash light made up for it.

Rarity noticed immediately that the fridge had three locks on the handle. The stove had a single padlock across its handle. She checked the fridges locks first, two needed keys, and the last one needed a code, being a spinning dial with letters on it. Written in crayon on the door, just above and to the left of the handle was a note with a key on it.

"I'll give you one, and that's it. The first is near, in the cold, the second is in the box about mom and dad. The third is the most important date."

Rarity pulled the door of the freezer open. Inside was a small block of ice with a gray key inside of it. She tried the key she got from the door itself, but it didn't go to any of the ones on the fridge itself. Trying the stove next , it clicked open, and she found the oven on, and burning at a good temperature. She placed the block of ice in the oven, and closed it. After a few seconds, it dinged. Opening it, the oven turned itself off. The key was probably hot to the touch, so she picked it up with her magic, and found it unlocked one of the padlocks on the fridge. Now she would just need one more key and a some numbers.

She scoured the cabinets, but found no other clues to the key or the number puzzle. She went back into the living room. Blueblood shot her an icy glare. "Find anything?"

"No." She went down the stairs to the left. She heard him say something, but chose to ignore him.

At the bottom of the stairs was a sizable bedroom. The room was lavishly furnished, with a queen sized bed opposite of the stairs, a hutch to the right and a desk and stool to the left. Each was a master piece of wood working, with pictures of suns and flowers carved into them all.

Rarity walked to the bed, and felt the silk sheets on it.

"Somepony had great taste." She said to herself, rubbing the sheet against her cheek. A light flickered on behind her, gray and bright. She turned to find a TV, hidden from her sight when she first entered. It sat on a wooden table, and was behind a curtain. Pulling the curtain away, she saw a portion of the wedding of her father and mother. Her father wore a burgundy suit, and her mother a white dress. Both looked fantastic, but she felt her mother was stunning in her wedding gown. They were walking down a small set of steps.

It was their wedding video. She stared at it, watching as they exchanged silent vows, and holding hooves. She looked around the TV, finding the VCR that held the cassette. She hit the eject button, and the black tape that came out was labeled rather plainly, 'Our Wedding'.

Rarity held the tape in her hooves, and tried to figure a few things out. She had never lived in Silent Mane, so how did this tape end up there? She also knew for a fact the wedding tape her mother kept had a date on it, which could possibly be the 'most important date' on the note on the fridge. She racked her brain, trying to remember the date.

Another light turned on, next to the bed, and she saw it out of the corner of her eye. It was a lamp on the desk. Rarity approached it, levitating the video tape as she went. The desk was clear, save for a single folder, with a medical cross and wreaths imprinted on the front. Below the symbol were the words 'Manehaven Hospital'. She opened it, placing the tape next to it. Inside was a single paper, a medical discharge summary. The name, race, and age were all scratched out. The date at the top was 4/6/81. The gender was female, and it said the cause of injury was a 'sudden fall down a flight of stairs'. On the margin was a hoof written note:

"I'm sending the parents to Dr. Write. This is the fourth time this month this filly has been here. I suspect domestic abuse. - Dr. Perry Cot."

She turned the paper over, but found it was empty on the reverse side. The doctor was assuming the parents were harming their own child. 'How dreadful, especially if he was right', she thought to herself, taking note of the date. She might as well try it to be the code to the number lock. She looked next at her parents wedding tape, took the knife from her pocket and cut the small hinges that held the top to the body. She shook it gently and a new key fell out. She placed it in her pocket, and went to check the hutch last.

The doors creaked as she did so, and a small orange light flickered from inside of it. There was a lit candle on its only shelf, just below head level. The candle illuminated a black and white photograph. The photo was of a white stallion in a rather promiscuous position with a white mare. She felt dirty for just looking at it and quickly closed up the hutch, erasing the photo from her mind.

She went back upstairs to find that Prince Blueblood was still siting on the couch, but this time he watched her every move, like a hunter watching a deer. He said nothing and made no movements. Just watching. She felt a little strange, but ignored him, and she went straight to the kitchen. The key of course fit into the lock, and to her surprise the date actually worked, even if she did not know the importance of it. Opening the fridge, she expected the worst only to find a small red gem. It was a plain, rough cut, ruby with four sides and a mirror sheen. But nothing else.

She searched the cabinets again, and found nothing again. She went out into the living room, floating the gem above her head. She had intended to go back downstairs and look for more clues when Prince Blueblood tackled her to the ground. His mouth bit down onto the bridge of her nose, and he grabbed the ruby with his own magic and made a beeline for the rusted door, delivering a rough kick to her side. She felt a small trickle of blood racing down her face, and her side was on fire, as she lay on the floor, trying to understand what had just happened. She heard the rusted door open, and the voices of ponies hollering at the Prince. He had found their way out. Well, she had found the way out, but he had forcibly stolen it from her and took the credit for himself. She stood up, wiping her face clean with the arm of her jacket and followed after the prince.

The prince had placed the ruby in an indention on the door, which he had probably noticed and refused to mention to her. She pushed the door open, wincing at the loud, rusty creak that came out of it. She poked her head out first, hoping to not see the Prince anywhere, and hoping to be in the real world.

What met her was the empty stocking room of the grocery store, and the dead filly that inhabited it...


	14. Double Play

The Tower

The stocking room was just as quiet as before. The filly that had been laying dead before was still there. Rarity let out a long exasperated sigh.

"All that for nothing." She said to herself, and tried to decide where to go next. She knew that when she reached the police station, she would get back at Prince Blueblood for attacking her. But she would have to get there first. And being back where she started sure wasn't helping her make any forward progress. As she stood, staring down at her map, she heard a familiar siren in the distance. The same one that sounded just as that injured mare give up her attack. She began to wonder if it meant the mare was attacking somepony else, or if it was going to come back for her. The thought sent shivers down her spine.

Looking back at the map, Rarity ran her hooves on all the roads looking for a more indirect path to the police station. She found one path leading all the way around town, and through a park. It was one of the only paths that took her off the main road. She should be able to avoid any of those metal road blocks. She folded the map back up and placed in her pocket, and began to make her way back to the front of the store. As she opened the double doors leading back into the store, her radio began to emit a garbled mass of static.

The sound of hooves scrambling on the linoleum was coming from one of the aisles to her left. There were seven aisles to look down, and now she was out in an open area. She carefully tip toed past the aisles, poking her head out before she would walk past them. The second to last aisle was the one the sounds were coming from, and now, as she stood against the blunt end of the metal shelves, the sounds were much more frantic.

Poking her head around the corner, she could barely make out the shape of a pony standing on tall spindly legs, its neck a long and narrow tube, like a snake's body. It's head was flat, like the end of a hose pushed close. Bringing her flashlight to bear, she found that another pony, a stallion by the looks of him, was underneath its tall frame, held in place by the bones in its open ribcage clamping around his sides. The hose like head opened as its neck wormed around the stallions neck, choking him. The now open head closed around his head, fitting around his head like a glove.

The stallion struggled even harder, trying to force his entire body up to push it off, but it easily forced him down, and even lower to the ground. Rarity lifted her knife from her pocket. Even though she wasn't using her hooves to hold the blade, it was shaking wildly in the air. The creature had no eyes, but she hoped it couldn't sense her through some other means as she drove the knife forward, aiming to cut it across the base of its neck. Its skin was like rubber, and the blade didn't even scratch it. Rarity tried again, stabbing the blade straight into it this time. The thing bled a strange gray liquid all over its victim, but it began to stagger back and away as the blade penetrated its flesh.

The hose like head made a slurping noise as it released the head of the stallion, who fell in a heap, coughing and spitting up gray chunks. The monster staggered back, and than tried to lean forward, and thrust its entire body over him again. Rarity pushed forward as it tried to attack again, slashing the knife back and forth, driving it back as the blade hit against its rubbery head. She could hear the stallion struggle to stand as he fell and hit against one of the shelves. Rarity glanced back at him, noting he was still low to the floor, and turned back just in time to find the monsters head trying to snake along the ground towards her. She slammed the knife down pinning the thinner part of the things head to the floor.

She than spun around, and pushed herself under the stallions left side, helping him to stand, and began to walk him back to the stocking room. The creature struggled to get its head free of the floor, but as Rarity pushed open the door to the stocking room, she could tell it wasn't following her. She tried to lower him to the ground carefully, but his legs buckled out from beneath him, and he slammed down to the hard concrete with an audible gasp. He was a Pegasus with a light brown coat, with swatches of a light tan on the front of his hooves, and his muzzle was the same light tan as well. His hair was a straight but messy dark brown that matched his eyes. He was surprisingly lithe, as if he was malnourished.

"My apologies! Are you alright, sir?" She nudged him in the shoulder with her head and felt panic rise in her when he made no response. She nudged him again, in the chest this time, and he began to have another coughing fit. She forced him to sit up, and held him up with her fore legs, giving a rough pat on the back to help him clear his throat. He threw up, barely missing her fore legs. His vomit smelt of smoke and was the same ashy color as the monsters blood. She pushed him a little further into the stocking room, still against the wall, but away from his vomit.

When he finally settled down, he was still breathing heavily, and resting against the wall instead of making her hold him up. His eyes were glazed over as he stared at the opposite wall.

"Are you feeling any better, Mr...?" She began, trying to be friendly with him. She looked over him, knowing his answer would be no. He was beat up, all four of his legs were covered in bruises, his body bore one large bruise that covered his entire back. And his wings were both broken in several places, and he had tied them to his body with a piece of rope.

"Free Fall." He said, his voice was raspy and it was obvious his mouth and throat were dry. "My name is Free Fall."

"I'm Rarity. Its a pleasure to meet you, despite the circumstances. I was beginning to think that the only other pony I would run into was that despicable Blueblood." She said his name with venom. He coughed a few times in response. "Hold on, I'll see if there's any water around here." She left him against the wall, and began to check the shelves for any source of water. On one of the lower shelves was a full case of bottles of water, and lacking her knife, she had to rip it open with her teeth. Taking six with her magic, she turned around to find Free Fall shakily trying to stand, using the wall as support.

"What are you doing?" She asked, moving over to him and trying to force him to sit down. Seeing as how he was weak and tired, she accomplished sitting him down easily. "Perhaps you should rest a minute, or sixty?"

He gave her what must have passed for a half dazed glare as she opened the first bottle of water and held it up to his mouth. He gripped it weakly in his mouth and began to drink from it. His entire body seemed to get better in an instant, he stopped leaning on the wall and was actually able to shake his head at a brisk pace, and his entire body language changed to being less hostile.

"Thank you." Was all he could mutter, knowing full well he had acted somewhat rudely a moment before. "For saving me as well."

"It was nothing, really. Exactly what was that thing? Some kind of monster?" He gave her a shocked look.

"Monster? I suppose its based off a monster. What it really was, was a memory, of sorts." He sounded like he didn't believe himself, and he took another large drink of water.

"A memory? What kind of memory would have that as a physical form?" She was taken back by the sudden look of pain that crossed his delicate features. "My apologies, I didn't mean to press. I was just a little too curious is all."

"It was my mom. Or, well, my step mom. When I was a colt she killed my real mother and burnt her body, putting the ashes in my birthday cake. I was the unwanted child of my father cheating on my step mother. It drove her to the brink and she pushed herself over. She locked me in the basement for six days once, too. I forgot those memories for seventeen years. Than I move back here and they all came flooding back in this fog." His voice stayed a steady monotone, and the way in which he casually explained it all only added to the obvious hints of psychological damage. His eyes watered up, and he stared across the hall at the wall. Rarity said nothing, she fumbled for words, occasionally grasping a few syllables in her breath, but never actually saying anything. She felt a strange warmth come from him, not the warmth one finds in a kindred soul, but an actual heat, like he was a burning fire.

"I only have one place left, I think. My old home. I'm scared to go back, but at the same time, I have to finish this. I don't want it to hang over my head for the rest of my life. Besides, I tried to walk out of town, you just walk right into town on the other side." He forced a smile and dabbed at the small pools of tears at the bottom of his eyes.

"I...I don't know what to say. I'm only here looking for my sister." He nodded solemnly. "I mean, how could memories take solid form and attack ponies. It just seems so impossible."

"Yeah, it does. Its strange when you think about it." He paused for a moment, letting out a weak cough, "Your sister huh? If you'd like I could keep an eye out for her."

"That would be a tremendous help. Her name is Sweetie Bell, shes a filly, a dull white with a purple, pink mane. I was just trying to make my way to the police station, to see if they could help me find her, but seeing how empty this place is, I can imagine what it will be like there." He let out a loud chortle.

"That's the last place you'll end up. I wanted to come here, to get food when I finished moving in. That was two days ago, from what I can tell. I've had hunger pains the entire time. And when I finally got here, I wasn't hungry anymore." A long and uncomfortable silence settled into the room. "I also have this, if you want it. Its a key one of those big metal walls, its just a street over." He produced a silver key, and placed it on the floor. She levitated it into one of her coat pockets.

"Thank you, I am quite sure it will come in handy."

"I have a favor to ask, as well." He averted his eyes, obviously ashamed by what he was about to say, Rarity also noted that he had locked his fetlocks together, and was rubbing them briskly. "If you wake from this nightmare, could you possible see if I have as well. I don't know where I'll end up. But it would be nice to see a familiar face once I'm there."

It wasn't much to ask for, so she nodded, then asked, "Where do you think you'll wind up?"

"Its weird, ya know. Ever since I saw the old slide show in the library of my step-mom abusing me, everything has been engulfed in fire. It burnt at first, but now it doesn't. I wonder if it means I've come to terms in my heart with what I did, or if my heart just can't care any more." He stared blankly across the room again. He stood up, quickly running a hoof over his own eyes, wiping away forming tears. "I'm, sorry. I should get going. Is there anything else I can do for you before I go?"

She shook her head, and he tried to smile, but lost it half way through the motion. She watched him walk through the old rusted door, and she could have sworn that just before it closed, the walls and floor were ablaze in an orange inferno.

With him gone, she began to go over her map once more, and found the street that he was talking about. Swallow Street. It was one of the smaller roads, and it lead directly to the hotel in the middle of town. It was better than nothing, she figured, as she went to retrieve her knife from the store...


	15. How Far We Travel

From Dark to Darker

Rarity left the grocery stocking room via the double doors for the second time, and as she entered the Grocer itself, she noted her radio emitted no noise. The short hallway led back into the linoleum floored grocery store, and she was at the end of the aisles. She tried to count the number of aisles to her left, and there was only one to her right, but the darkness made that task impossible, so she would just have to go up and down each and every one until she found her knife. The aisles were well stocked and managed as she walked up and down them, careful not to step on the bladed instrument. As she approached the second to last aisle, she found the familiar form of the hose necked monster laying in the middle of the aisle. Rarity approached it with grace and caution, making almost no noise on the linoleum.

The creature was made of some kind of rubber, she realized as she prodded it with a hoof. The skin was a weak gray, like ash. Its body was far larger than any pony she had ever met, even Celestia. As she walked around it, she saw the small green hilt of her knife jutting out of the creatures strangely shaped head. She gripped it with her magic and gave it a fairly strong tug, pulling it free and ripping the mouth of the creature open wider. She backed away from it, not wanting to turn her back on the monster, just in case, until the ends of the metal shelves came into her eyesight.

She slowly side stepped to her left, towards the last aisle, keeping the creature just barely visible through the darkness with her flashlight. She chose to leave through the last aisle, heading for the store front when red lettering at the end of the aisle caught her attention. The words were just before the end of the aisle, written on the black and white linoleum, and the substance was very old cake frosting. It read quite simply:

'In this town, there are many dark secrets.

Each one possessing a pony,

or each pony possessing one?

Are we ever truly free from the bonds of truth?

Or are we trapped at birth by destiny and lies?

The heart must never know, what the mind can never remember.'

She was still reading it when the sound of a conveyer belt starting loudly caught her attention. She looked up, and peeked around the corner of the shelf. She couldn't see which one was on, but the noise indicated that they were close by and to her right. She finished reading the cake frosting, and carefully moved around it, into the store front. She could finally see outside through the window panes that made up the majority of the stores front wall, and the fog was gone. It had been replaced by a strange and alien darkness, where no stars or moon were visible in the dark sky. She continued to walk right, towards the sound of the conveyer belt.

One of the checking lines had started itself up, the one numbered five, and as she watched it she felt a small smile creep over her face. Wrapped in a bow was a wooden baseball bat, bouncing and jolting at the movement of the belt beneath it. She lifted it with her magic and spun it lazily in the air. It was a lot heavier than her knife, so she wouldn't be able to swing it as quickly, but she would be able to swing it further away from her body, effectively doubling her reach for fight. Hovering it in front of her she removed the ribbon, it was a bright and flamboyant pink. She placed the ribbon on the conveyer belt and kept the bat hovering in front of her, as she turned to her right, and towards the sliding doors.

She had felt like she had been trapped in the grocery store for an eternity. Approaching the sliding doors, she noticed they lacked power and began to wonder if breaking and leaving was a crime. Bringing the bat up, she struck hard with a horizontal blow, sending shards of glass all over the concrete outside. Rarity swept the window with the baseball bat, clearing away as many of the lingering pieces of the glass that could stab her as she slid through.

The cold air of the outside world made Rarity shiver for a moment, but she adjusted to the cold quickly and felt content in the chilling air. Carrying her baseball bat, she began to walk up the street. It was a rather bland street, with housing on her left, and the empty and black street to her right. She had memorized the route to the hotel in her mind, but she still felt a sense of fear that she would end up going the wrong way. She watched the houses on her left, each one a plain white, waiting for the first turn as she trotted on.

The corner appeared suddenly through the darkness, a small green street sign pointing out the turn onto a nameless street. As she approached the sign she could hear the quiet sound of static emitting from her radio. She noisily gulped, and lifted her bat higher, ready for anything. She followed the side walk, moving around the corner, her head twisting in every direction as she searched for the source of the static.

Something shuffled in the darkness, and the sound of plastic scraping on the dirt of the road came from every direction. Her radio suddenly began to wail static in an ear piercing shriek. She twisted about frantically, looking for the source when it hit her, literally.

It had the outline of a mare, short and stocky, but it was a mannequin. It was shorter than she was, its yellow plastic skin shining brightly from the flashlight's beam as Rarity spun just before its attack. Rarity felt something warm running down her chest, just before she revolted away, nearly falling down as she scrambled back and into another one of the creatures. The first was short, but this one was tall and thin, and had an open mouth, full of what appeared to be razor sharp sewing needles.

The taller one tried to bite down, it's mouth just barely missing her hair as Rarity ducked down under its mouth. Rarity brought the end of the bat against the tall ones skull and heard a sickening crack as she smashed what sounded like both plastic and skull. The thing was knocked off balance and stumbled away from Rarity, listing to the left. Before Rarity could spin back around to confront the other one, she felt a sharp pain in her flank, and craned her head to look at the short monster.

At the end of its legs were long nail files, two or three per hoof. She could see her own blood slowly seeping past the grooming tool. Rarity brought a leg up, hitting the thing in the jaw and knocking it back. It quickly regained its composure, but by that time, Rarity was already swinging the bat as hard as she could in a horizontal sweep. Wood met plastic and bone, and the force tore the things head off entirely, and its body toppled over, following the force of the blow.

Assuming the short one was dead, Rarity turned a full 360, looking for its counter part, but the other had stumbled off into the darkness. She hesitated a moment, looking at the short one, which lay on its side, unmoving. She inspected her chest to find that the first wound from the short mannequin was shallow and had barely broken the skin. The one on her flank was much deeper and her own blood was still leaking out. She felt nauseous looking at the wound, and knew she would need to find some sort of first aid soon.

Cautiously, she began to make her way to the hotel again, keeping an ear open, waiting for her radio to go off again at any moment...


	16. What To Do With Blueblood

The Question of what to do about Blueblood

Rarities chest and flank hurt, the pain was sharp and debilitating. She found herself almost limping as she tried to trot down the sidewalk. Small red pools of crimson pooled around her hoof whenever she slowed. Her breath had slowly left her and she now breathed raggedly as she dragged her baseball bat on the ground behind her. She continued on the sidewalk, using its winding form to determine her direction. She had been left alone by the Mannequin that had escaped. She had found Swallow Street without any more trouble from monsters and made her turn onto it. It was now a straight shot to the hotel.

She had been able to see the hotel from the turn some hundreds of feet behind her, it was a six story building, awash with yellow light coming down from the black sky, like the sun shining in between clouds. It seemed to be a great distance away, like a star in the sky. She felt the road begin to slope upward and her flank began to burn as she pushed herself to keep moving. The hill continued upwards for a few feet before it leveled out...and than dropped off.

Swallow Street, for all intents and purposes didn't exist. Rarity approached the edge, looking over in the black abyss. She couldn't see the ground below which made her feel uneasy, so she backed away, sitting on the hard side walk. She could see the other side of the chasm, there was the metal fence just a few feet past the chasm. She could even make out the frame of the door in the darkness. She sat there for a few moments, feeling a small pool of her own blood forming around her haunches. She closed her eyes for a second and let herself calm down. She wanted to scream at her bad luck.

Her radio began to hiss. No, she screamed in her head, turning to face the sloping road. The tall mannequin was peering over the lip of the slope, its eyeless head transfixed on her. Another eyeless head popped up next to the first, and than another, and another, and another. The road was thick with them, but they were unmoving, entirely content to just watch her for a moment. One on the far left began to creep forward.

Rarity tried to back up, and felt a hoof slip over the edge. No escape, and now the entire hoard began to march on her. She lifted her bat in the air, watching as the mannequins slowly converged on her. The first wave had already come up onto the level ground, and Rarity could see even more coming up the hill.

She felt fear rising in her chest as they crested the hill, she knew it might be the end of her. The first one approached her, picking up pace and trying to hit her from her right so she couldn't fight back. She caught the movement in her peripheral vision and swung the bat at full force, knocking the mannequin in the side of the chest and over the lip of the chasm. As she faced to the right, another came in from behind her, trying to throw its entire body over her and bite into the back of her neck. She shook it off, bucking as wildly as her injured flank would allow her, and it slid off, falling over the edge. The pull of the mannequin dragged her front right hoof over the edge for a second, and before she could pull herself up, one of the creatures bit into her left leg, and dragged her back up onto solid ground. She cried out, feeling her magical grasp on her bat slipping. The wooden weapon slid into the darkness below. Three of the things stood over her, trying to bite into her chest and neck.

She brought her front hooves up and did her best to keep them away from her. To her surprise she was able to keep two away with ease, but the third's head caught onto her leg, and tried to pry her defense apart.

"Rarity!" A voice suddenly called out, from across the chasm. Even the monsters were surprised by the call. Rarity looked up, from her laying position she could see across the chasm. Prince Blueblood stood on the far side, levitating a ladder beside him. He dropped the ladder, it landed a foot or two to her right, crossing the gap with a foot to spare. With a burst of strength, Rarity threw all four of her hooves out, hitting the three pinning her down and stumbling them. She stood as quickly as she could and willed her body to move. The pain in her flank slowed her to nearly a crawl. She limped onto the ladder, feeling it shift slightly under her weight. Looking at her savior, Rarity saw him grab onto it with his front hooves to steady it. The rungs were easy to walk on, she just took each step with care, knowing that if she upset the ladder, she would easily topple off.

She tried to move across it as fast as she could, feeling weighed down still by her flank. Looking behind her, she realized she was barely a fourth of the way across and that two of the things were trying to follow her. She knew they would catch up to her, so she drew her knife from her pocket and continued to cross as best as she could. Half way, she told herself, trying to inspire herself.

Just as she passed what she considered the half way mark, a sudden flaring pain rocked her back left leg. One of the things had bitten into her, and ripped out a small chuck of the meat on her leg. She nearly threw up, and carefully tried to kick it away from her, and swung her knife at it, doing everything she could to dislodge it from the ladder. After a good kick and stab, it slid off, going limp as it fell. A paint can sailed over her head and smashed into the head of the next one, only a few rungs behind her. Its head smashed in, and it toppled off the ladder to.

Looking back up at Blueblood, he had another can gripped with his magic and was rearing back to give it some extra force. He let it fly, hitting the next one still climbing onto the ladder. Rarity felt dizzy, her head was swimming in the clouds as she forced each of her hooves to move to the next rung, one at a time. Blueblood had bought her enough time to make it safely across. As she placed her first hoof on solid ground, he grabbed her, putting his fore legs around her shoulders and dragging her off the ladder. Letting go of her, he kicked the ladder until it slid of the ledge, sending four more monsters into the darkness below. Before she could thank her savior, Rarity felt light headed, placed her head on the hard black top, and fell asleep...

Voices in the Dark

"Your sister huh? If you'd like I could keep an eye out for her." Free Fall's voice drifted into her head, but with no accompanying images. Rarity immediately realized she was dreaming.

"I need to be protected. There's a monster out there!" Blueblood. She wondered if maybe she was dead, and that this was the after life. He probably was too lazy to move her away from those mannequins.

"This guy, Free Fall. He has a filly with him, named Sweetie Bell. He's going to sacrifice her to escape this place. I tried to save her, I really did, but its like hes possessed. I'm lucky to have gotten out of there with my life!" Blueblood again. She couldn't recall him saying that. Before she had time to ponder it, she felt a warm light overtake her, and she awoke in less perfect surroundings...


	17. Tales

Ghost in the Dark

Rarity felt her senses come back one at a time. First was touch, and she could tell she was inside, for it was warm again and she was on a mattress, thick and made with springs. Smell returned next, and she wished it hadn't. Wherever she was, it smelt of burnt flesh, rust and mold. Next came taste, which was useless, save for the taste of blood in her mouth. Then came hearing, which was useful for she could hear someone showering and something metal slowly tapping against a wall.

Finally came sight. She was in a well lit room, definitely a hotel room with some sort of demonic flare thrown in. The room was small, with a single bed, centered against the wall opposite of the door. She was laying on it, facing the door. To her right was a window, locked and barred, but she could see fog outside the glass. To the left was a small TV with its own stand and an end table, with a small brown bottle with a picture of the Flim Flam Brothers on it. The walls were slick with blood, and from the roof hung chains with hooks on the ends of them. Despite the grisly appearance of the room, she was more concerned with Blueblood, who she assumed was in the shower.

Across from her, at the door, she saw her jacket laying on the floor, and a small hallway that led to the left. It was probably the bathroom, where the noise of running water was coming from. She felt conflicted on what to do about Blueblood. He was a jerk one minute, and her hero the next. She tried to rationalize what he had done in that house attached to the grocery store, but couldn't find any real reason for why he had attacked her. Maybe his own cowardice got the better of him? She also noted that all of her injuries were miraculously gone. Not just that they had stopped bleeding, but that they had left virtually no marks.

The water stopped and she sat up, feeling the dirt and grime of the sheets underneath her shifting with her. A few seconds later she heard a door lock click and Prince Blueblood came out from around the corner, a towel draped over his body. He smiled at her when their eyes met.

"Good to see your finally awake, Sleeping Beauty." His smile was infectious as she felt a smile creeping over her own features. "I was starting to get worried about you." He sounded sincere enough.

"Um, Prince Blueblood," Rarity began but was cut off by Blueblood.

"Please. Just Blueblood. I find this hard to say, mostly because I am still in shock from my own poor behavior, but I'm sorry for attacking you earlier. I know it may sound crazy, but when you came back out of that kitchen, you looked like some kind of monster, with all this weird medical gear on you. I am deeply sorry, Miss Rarity." His smile quickly turned into a depressed scowl.

"Oh my, I didn't realize it troubled you so badly Blueblood. I...accept your apology." He beamed, and continued his apology.

"And I must say that my behavior at the Grand Gala was deplorable, and unnecessary. Sometimes when I'm around some of my more formal family members, I just get into this sense of aristocratic entitlement. I know that I can't just walk all over people whenever I choose. I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me." He was still beaming, and had moved from the corner of the hall to the bed, taking one of Rarities hooves in her own, and gently caressing it.

"Of course I do. It would be wrong to do so when your baring your soul to me. I would also like to say thank you for saving me. I would be dead now, if not for you" She felt strangely connected with the Prince.

"It was no problem, my lady. So, may I ask a lady what brings her to a place like this?" He moved to sit next to her on the bed.

"I'm looking for my little sister. She ran away and came here, for some awful reason." Her face grimaced as she remembered her strange dream. Did Free Fall really have her? And was he going to hurt her?

"A filly?" He paused and waited for her to nod. His eyes grew wide in realization, "This guy, Free Fall, he has a filly with him, named Sweetie Bell. He's going to sacrifice her to escape this place. I tried to save her, I really did, but its like hes possessed. I'm lucky to have gotten out of there with my life!" He made the connection immediately, and assumed Sweetie Bell to be her missing sister.

"You barely managed to get out of where, Blueblood? Where is he? Where is Free Fall?"

"Hes in room 402, on the fourth floor. Why? Are you going to go after him? He almost killed me with just a swing of his hoof."

Rarity sighed, she just wanted to collect her sister and go home. "I guess I have to if I'm going to find Sweetie Bell."

"Do be careful. I'd go with you, but the elevator only allows a certain weight limit, and I'm much to large for it. You should be fine though." He moved from the bed, and lifted up her jacket. He levitated it over to her. "I put your knife back into one of the pockets."

She smiled as she put the jacket back on, and sifted through her pockets. Everything was accounted for. "I would feel remiss if I said goodbye. I hope we run into each other again soon." She held out a hoof, and he gladly took it, squeezing it loosely.

"Until then, Miss Rarity." He opened the door for her. Rarity couldn't see past the door frame, not even to the wall on the opposite side of what she assumed was going to be a hallway. She stepped out, and he closed the door.

The hotel hall suddenly appeared, it was dark and dank, and she was all the way at the end of one side of it. Directly in front of her, where a door was supposed to be was a steel mesh frame that she could see through. On the other side was what appeared to be two skinless ponies in the middle of something, thrashing in a small cage that floated all on its own. Something about their movements were enthralling, and even though both of their faces were contorted in strange emotions, they seemed to be in bliss.

Rarity averted her eyes, and went in the only direction available to her, to the left. The hall was incredibly dark, to the point her flashlight barely lit up a few feet in front of her. She passed only a few rooms as she went, each door locked as she tried to open each and every one, they were all locked however. The hall went on for a few more minutes, showing just how large the hotel was. The doors were all marked with three numbers, each one starting with a two, indicating she was on the second floor.

Rarities radio began to pick up static. She pulled her knife from her pocket, and held it a little high, ready to stab out at anything that got in her way. She continued down the dark hall, moving slower as she went. Her radio stayed a steady hiss, when her flashlight beamed against a set of metal doors.

It was an elevator. Her radio began to get louder. Looking on the left and right sides of the doors, she couldn't find any buttons to call the machine. She quietly cursed, turning around to face whatever was making her radio act up. The quiet grind of the elevator suddenly became clear to her, and she had to resist turning back around to check on it.

Her radio got louder still, and her flashlight failed to penetrate the darkness of the hallway before her. A light burst through the darkness, almost to small to see, despite it obviously being the door to Blueblood's room in the distance opening. Something large was trying to force its way out of the door, which was far to small for it. She held her breath, wondering if something had just magically appeared in the room and hurt Blueblood. The light of the room blackened the thing, making it far to dark to make out anything other than it having the shape of a fat and tall stallion. Too much of both to be Blueblood.

The elevator continued to grind on as the thing slipped into the dark, leaving the weak light of the hotel room in the distance. She knew she had a at least two or three minutes before it would be on her, and that was only if it was running.

Her flashlight began to flicker on and off, making the hall before her look like a haunted house. Just before it flickered off, a gray hoof stepped into view, and than Rarity was thrust into darkness. She could hear her own ragged breathing better than ever before, and tried to calm herself by gripping the knife harder with her telekinesis, and preparing herself to stab at anything that touched her.

She knew it had to be close, but could hear nothing but herself in the perfect darkness. Something wet and slimy reached under her slapped nosily against her stomach and slid up her chest and neck. It felt like a tongue, but was far to long and she could feel a hardened metal point and the end.

She swung wildly into the darkness, but couldn't feel the knife connect with anything.

Ding.

The noise made her jump, and as the doors slid open to reveal a weak yellow light, her flashlight turned back on, revealing that the hallway directly in front of her was entirely empty.

Unnerved, she slid into the elevator, and hastily pressed the button for the fourth floor. When the doors slid closed and the elevator began to move upward, she let out a weak and stifled cry. She felt deeply disturbed by whatever had been in the hell with her. Checking over herself she could fell the wet and sticky substance that had come off the thing. It felt like thick spit, almost like watered down glue. She cleared her mind of the thing, and prepared herself for confronting Free Fall. He had seemed so distant and lifeless when she had met him, so she couldn't have just assumed he was going to try and murder her sister. At least Blueblood had come through for her. The elevator dinged, and she had been so lost in thought that she just than saw that there was white writing on the door, just above eye level.

'And the Last Fortress is Truth'

She just hoped that she wasn't to late to save Sweetie Bell...


	18. Fire

Fire

The elevator doors opened revealing a dark hallway not unlike the one from the second floor. Rarity slowly exited the metal box, her flashlight illuminating the first set of doors in the hall. She assumed it would be the same length as the last one. As she exited she readied her knife, waiting for a brief moment for her radio to alert her. The hall was quiet, and she relaxed, allowing the knife to hover closer to her, but still at the ready.

As she moved down the hall she easily found the door she wanted, being the first one on the right, it was different than the one opposite it however. The door that read 401 on the other side of the hall was made of wood. The one that read 402 directly in front of her was made of stone. It also had no handle. She cursed her luck, feeling frustration begin to drive her. She thought about just hitting the door or jamming the knife into the empty handle hole and trying to open it that way. She tried to calm her breathing, realizing it was coming out in quick and painful gasps. She scoffed at how worked up she was getting.

Deciding she had no other alternative, she decided she would explore the rest of the floor, in the hopes of finding the handle. She checked room 401 to find it locked, sighed and continued down the hall.

403. Locked.

404. Locked.

405. The lock is broken.

406. Opened.

The wooden door swung open, rather loudly as ancient and rusted hinges cried out in protest. The room inside was just like the one she had awoken in, with the bathroom to her right, and the bed directly in front of her. The room had a strange purplish glow, coming from a small lamp standing on the center of the bed. Approaching the bed, she could see the small nook of the room where the TV would have been. It was replaced by a small board with pictures on it. Ten pictures in two rows of five.

Each one of the pictures was strange, like the lens was to close to the subject. Photography had never been one of Rarities interests, but she began to look over the photos. As she shifted and moved closer and than further away to look at each photo, small amounts of the purple light from the lamp hit the board, showing letters and, in some spots, words. She moved out of the way of the lamp, letting the light flood over the small board. Each picture had words on it, but they were of course jumbled. She could read : 'path ,truth ,never, closed, only,' and 'barred.' The rest required another picture to be next to it to make sense, as the word was cut off half way through.

She began to move them around, finding they were all magnetically stuck to the board, but easily adjusted. She worked with them for some time, feeling a bead of sweat roll down her face as she concentrated on the puzzle before her.

After what felt like hours to her, she had slid the pictures to make sense. The image itself shocked her, for it was a photo of her and Blueblood. They were in her hotel room after the Grand Gala, but she had a dazed look over her face, her eyes staring off in the distance. He was kissing her neck, laying on top of her. She gawked for a few minutes, trying to find the words to explain her confusion. She racked her brain, but could come up with no recollection of the event. What had happened between the two of them?

The words that were super imposed over the photos gave her no comfort as she read them:

'The path to truth is never barred. Only closed by our own eyes.' She had no real way of dealing with what she was staring at, and felt uneasy. The back of her head was suddenly sore, like she had bruised it and touched it. Something clicked in her head and she left the room, and went back to room 402.

The stone door was still closed, but now the handle was there. It was made of the same stone as the door and inlaid with brown jewels. Red writing had appeared on the doors rough surface: 

'And the Last Fortress is Truth.'

Rarity turned the handle and pushed the door inward. The door opened into a room much larger than the hotel itself. The carpeting was gone, replaced by dirt, and the room was circular with large stone pillars raising towards a non-existent ceiling. A strange light fluttered in from above, but no source could be seen. In the center of the room, on the tallest pillar, was Free Fall.

He stood with his chest puffed out in some sense of pride, and it seemed the light was shining directly on him. His eyes were closed, and he was unmoving. As Rarity looked over his form, she saw that all of his bruises were healed, and his wings were no longer bound to his body by rope. Words scrawled in the stone pillar caught her eye:

'And the Last Fortress is Truth. And its Last Defender is Doubt.'

Rarity waited for him to take notice of her, and after a minute of waiting, she cleared her throat.

His brown eyes opened half way, and he looked down at her, his mouth forming into a warm smile.

"Free Fall. Where is my sister?" He tilted his head to one side, as if he did not understand. He gave no response, merely staring at her.

"Answer me."

"Why don't you just say what you're thinking? What you were told to say?" He stopped smiling and lowered his head, but kept his eyes on her in a powerful glare.

She stared back, trying to match the intensity of his glare. He seemed to know of Blueblood's accusation of his intent to harm Sweetie Bell. "Was Blueblood telling the truth? Are you planning to hurt my little sister?"

"Will my answer make a difference?"

"I suppose it might. I don't know if I can trust you, Free Fall, or anything you say." He suddenly flared his wings out, and his lips transformed into a snarl.

"And you can trust Blueblood so easily? He must have done a great feat to be beyond the shadow of doubt. So, why don't you just say it! Call me a murderer, like he told you to."

"Where is my sister?" She avoided the question, nearly screaming at him.

"Answer my question and I will answer yours."

She sighed in defeat. "Fine. Yes. I can't escape the feeling that you are trying to hurt my sister."

He smirked, "I tried to protect your sister, I found her in the remains of my home, but we were attacked by a gray monster, and she fled, to the hospital."

She turned to leave, she had what she needed, but stopped when he called after her.

"There's one more thing. Sweetie Bell gave me this to give to you." Rarity spun back around, to watch the Pegasus leap from his perch and land in front of her, a black video tape in his mouth. She took it with her magic, and placed it in one of her coat pockets, even though it barely fit. "If you watch it till the end, it will show why our nightmares overlapped. I hope its useful. I'm leaving your nightmare. I still have my own to finish. Good Luck."

She tried to force a smile, but couldn't find the will to do so. "Thank you." She whispered, and headed back to the elevator. Inside the elevator, she found that the button for the first floor wouldn't work, and each time she pressed it, it would reply with a curt buzz. Deciding she had nowhere else to go, she hovered her hoof over the button to the second floor. Finding her courage, she pressed it, and felt the elevator begin to move. She thought about the thing that had been in the hallway, and her mind drifted back to Blueblood's room.

He had a working TV. She looked at the video tape. It was worth a try, she decided.

Ding. The doors opened to reveal a perfectly lit hallway. It was almost like she was in the real world. Walking out into the light, it became apparent that she was not back in the real world. At the far end of the hall she could see the open door to Blueblood's hotel room, and behind her, coming from the shaft above the elevator she could hear a sickening slurping sound. She turned to face the elevator and slowly walked away from it, going backwards to keep an eye on it.

A silver tipped tongue slipped out first, flickering in the air, the mouth it was attached to following shortly after. The space between the elevator and the shaft was to small for the thing's body, so it shoved the elevator down, snapping the wire and sending the elevator to the ground below in a loud crash.

The head came into view, it was an elongated ponies face, with the more squared features of a stallion. It was so large, she could tell just by looking at it, she would have been able to fit inside of its mouth with no problem. Its head was more like a ball than a ponies head though, with beady black eyes staring at her with lust. Its body came afterward, a fat and repugnant, bloated body with deep gashes where the skin had stretched to thin for the massive body. At first she thought it to have five legs, when the disgusting reality of the things enlarged stallionhood dragged on the ground between its back legs.

"RaRrityy." The sound that issued from its mouth was so guttural and disturbing that it took a few moments for it to sink into her head that it was an actual word. Her name.

She had stopped. The thing before her was so revolting it had caused her entire body to seize up. It lifted a leg, making strange sounds as it did so, as if it was struggling to just breath.

Rarity bolted down the hall way, galloping as hard as fast as she could, feeling every muscle in her body tensing up. Somehow the thing managed to keep a good few feet behind her, making wheezing and crying sounds as it did so. She ran until she was at the door to Blueblood's room, and she launched herself through the door, slamming it shut with her magic as she jumped past it. She laid on the carpet for a moment, staring at the door, and listening for the thing. It made no noise, and seemed to be leaving her alone. She proceeded into the room, looking for the small TV. It was where it had been before, in the nook beside the bed.

On top of it was a white cassette player. She placed the black tape into it, and sat down in front of the TV. The screen flickered, showing Blueblood standing in a short hallway. She recognized that he was standing right outside what was her room in Canterlot, during the Grand Galloping Gala. He looked at the camera.

"Don't stop filming, Mr. Write. Don't stop for anything."

Rarity watched. She watched a forty five minute long tape of Prince Blueblood injecting a drug into her while she was asleep and... Her mind reeled. The Prince had forced himself on her.

The thing in the hall was still quiet. Rarity sat on the bed, trying to hold back tears as the pain of the images she had seen on the screen played out in her mind, time and time again. She closed her eyes, sobbing gently.

She felt broken.

She felt tormented.

She felt something in her heart. Like a snake coiling around it.

"It burnt at first, but now it doesn't. I wonder if it means I've come to terms in my heart with what I did, or if my heart just can't care any more." Free Falls voice quietly whispered in her mind. She opened her eyes.

The hotel room was engulfed in fire. But it didn't burn...


	19. Truth

The Longest Hallway

The walls were burning. The carpet was burning. The bed on which Rarity lay was burning, but she felt no heat, no searing pain from the fire. It was cold, if anything. She had stopped crying for some reason that she could not fathom. It was like her body had nothing else to give. Like the fire was hallowing out her mind, body and soul. The tape was still playing, she realized, and moved to turn it off, afraid that the machine had some sort of auto rewind setting. She knew she wouldn't be able to bear watching that film a second time. Before she had even lifted herself off of the sheets, another image cut in on the TV. It was of another stallion, Mr. Write, she presumed. He was standing in the hallway outside of her Gala room. He was tall with a black mane, and brown fur. He was quiet with a strange familiarity in his voice when he spoke. Blueblood voice spoke from somewhere off camera.

"What about you, Mr. Write? Do you have anyone you want to get back at?"

Write merely stared off into the distance, his brown eyes seeming lifeless. "My son. He ruined my marriage."

"What's his name? Do you know where to find him?"

"Yeah. I do. And his name is Free Fall." The strange crooked smile that played upon his lips made Rarities skin crawl.

The tape cut out again, the screen becoming a haze of black lines and white fuzz. Rarity realized that Free Fall had watched this video as well, and from what he had said, Sweetie Bell must have seen it too. She felt her head begin to swim, her stomach lurched and her breath began to become ragged. The idea of Sweetie Bell watching that tape wormed its way into her mind and strangled the hope that she and her sister could just forget the entire experience.

If Sweetie Bell saw that tape, she would be as emotionally tormented as Rarity was. She remembered one of the other things Free Fall had said, that he and Sweetie Bell had been attacked by a gray monster. Had Blueblood tried to do something similar to Sweetie Bell? She felt like her blood was boiling in her veins.

Breathing heavily, she stood up on the bed, and step by shaky step, took the video tape from the VCR, placed it in her pocket, and made her way to the front door. The door was the only place in the hotel room that wasn't ablaze. Her chest was tight as she anticipated what would come next. Her hoof hesitated over the handle, and she became aware of how ragged her breathing had become. She focused her mind, and slowly turned the handle.

The door flew open, the sudden movement throwing her off her balance. She fell forward as a silver tipped tongue slipped into the room, feeling the air around her, flickering as saliva pooled underneath it, searching for her. She pulled her knife out, slowly and quietly. The silver tip flickered in the air, touching her ear, and lashing out, wrapping around her throat in a lightning quick shot. The skin on her neck was crawling as it tightened, trying to drag her out of the room. She brought her knife down, striking at the thick muscle, chocking for breath, as the blade took an unhealthy chuck of meat out of the tongue. It let go of her, falling to the floor, and slithering back into the hallway like a snake.

The things gray head shot into the door frame, its beady black eye staring at her, unblinking. Blood pooled around its motionless head, seeping out of its mouth. Rarity brought her knife up, and struck out, stabbing into the things right eye. It howled in pain, but refused to move. Seeing her possible only chance to escape, Rarity threw herself on its muzzle, felling its damaged tongue shoot up as soon as she put her first hoof on the things face. Its skin was like rubber stretched over a far to large tire. The skin ripped where she strode, forcing her hooves into its nauseating black blood. The tongue flickered up at her, but writhed in pain with each step she took. The thing didn't seem to respond to her movements, merely watching her with its other good eye.

She ran up its face, over its forelock and onto its back, and realized how large it was. She had to crouch and drag herself over its back to avoid the ceiling. She felt the warm blood underneath her, rubbing into her stomach. Halfway down its back, it ended its charade, and violently shook, throwing her onto the carpeted floor in between its engorged stomach and the wall. She had enough room to move a foot to her left or right, but it was slowly trying to roll over onto its side. As it pushed against the opposite wall, it made a space large enough for her to run past.

She moved as quickly as she could, running past the last few feet of its stomach, and leaping onto its back left leg. She lost her grip and slid backwards, her front hooves finding purchase. She began to drag herself up its leg, which was taller than most taxi's, when the sudden and shocking explanation for the things movement hit her. Hard.

It had been trying to maneuver its front left leg to be able to reach behind itself. As Rarity tried to climb up the back leg, the front one slammed into her, crushing her against the hoof and leg. She felt something snap in her chest, and pain tore into her. She let out a panicked scream, and felt her legs begin to go limp as the pain made her vision go white. It removed its leg, and was beginning the slow process of standing up. She slid onto the ground, laying on her back, and immediately forcing herself to stand back up on shaky legs. Its back leg nearly crushed her as it moved into a position to stand again.

Rarity began to walk as best she could, each step an agonizing knife of pain in her chest. Knife, she thought to herself, and looked behind her. The blade was laying on the ground, right where its back leg was moving to support its weight while it turned.

The hoof landed on the blade, it let out a small yelp, bringing its hoof up to inspect it. Rarity turned her head forward again. She was only half way down the hallway, her chest was on fire, and she couldn't catch her breath. Still she forced her legs to pick up the pace. Step by step, she told herself, but felt like it was hopeless. She let her head crane around to look at the thing one last time, thinking it to be the last sight in her life. She was staring into its gaping maw, its colossal mouth open in a silent roar. The tongue had healed, and wrapped around her leg, dragging her down. Her chin hit against the floor, and her teeth gnashed together painfully.

In a movement that seemed far to fast for its size, the gray monster whipped its head backward, and just as quickly shot forward, the tongue releasing as it flung her. She sailed through the air, going limp as she did so, and felt her mind empty. The soft carpet still hurt a lot when thrown into it at high speed. She hit with a loud thump, and felt what little breath she had leave her. She was on her side, staring up at the open elevator doors, her head teetering on the edge of the open chasm. She could feel the vibrations of its enormous legs setting down with all the grace of bulldozer.

She struggled to make her body move, she just needed one leg to pull herself over the edge. Her left front leg numbly fell over the edge, and she tried to force it to pull her over. Her strength was gone, sapped by the monster. Its hoof beats were deafening now. She kicked both of her back legs out, and felt her upper torso slide over the lip of the shaft. She closed her eyes as she fell backwards into the darkness. She passed out just as she went into free fall.

Voices in the Dark, Part 2

"I need an ambulance at 402 Swallow Street, the Silent Mane hotel. I have an injured mare, severe wounds." She could hear somepony, but no matter how hard she tried, her eyes wouldn't open to see who. Their voice was steely and strong.

"Is she gonna be alright?" A mare, frightened.

"Who's that?" Another voice, mare, confused.

"Officer, this tape slid off of her." A colt, young, maybe almost a stallion, terrified. The first voice was a Police Officer, Rarity figured.  
"Thats not hers, that is mine." Blueblood. Her mind reeled, knowing what would happen if he got the tape.

"What? Buck off guy, it fell out of her jacket." The colt again, she could hear them fighting over the tape, she never figured Blueblood to be violent, but it sounded as if he had punched the unknown voice.

"Hold it! Put your hooves down, put the tape on the ground and back off. Both of you." The office, moving away from her. "Until proven otherwise, this is evidence."

Silence. The silence was deafening, unnatural and punctuated by the constant and calming beep of a heart monitor. She still couldn't open her eyes.

"Hey, Rarity." It was Free Fall, his voice was softer than before, like he had had something stuck in it and finally cleared it. "Guess I should have promised to look for you, huh?" He became quiet, obviously berating himself for the ill timed joke. "Sorry, I shouldn't be joking right now. I just wanted to come by and let you know that the police have arrested Blueblood. He's being investigated by the town police and the Royal Guard. He won't be able to slip away from this. Um, when you wake up, I put a brown bottle on the nightstand. I know you don't trust me, but believe me, I just want to help. The stuff in it will make you feel a lot better than their medicine. It tastes horrible, by the way." There was a long silence. "Be safe, alright?" She felt him nuzzle her shoulder. "Your sister still needs you."


	20. The Hospital

The Hospital

Rarity woke up in a sudden and painful spasm. Her chest was tight, and every muscle in her body was tightening and loosening in quick bursts. The dull gray of the roof tiles above her was the first thing she saw, and it was an unwelcome sight. There were bloodstains on the ceiling. Her body began to relax, the spasms subsiding as she tried to move her head.

She was in a small hospital room, it was dirty and messy. She was laying on a gurney in the center of the room. There were no machines around her like she had heard in her dream. Sitting up, she looked around the room. To her left was a small window showing her the outside world, still a gray fog. Under the window was a small table with several drawers. On top of of the table was a small brown bottle. To her right was a small couch, covered in dust with a strange, small, silver box with a long silver tube jutting out of one side. On the things underside was a half circle with a curved piece of metal inside it. Next to the thing was three golden coins, thinner than a bit, but wider. Behind her was just the wall, and in front of her was just the door and a window in the hall.

As she looked out into the hall, her eyes slowly adjusted to the extreme darkness outside of the room. There was a mare outside the room, looking in. As she watched it watch her, she made out the shape of casts that adorned its body, and multiple bandages that covered it. It was wearing a medical gown. It slowly lifted a hoof and placed it on the glass. It was the Injured Mare from the storage room of the Grocery Store.

Rarity turned her attention to the door, wondering if it was locked, or if the monster could come in. Irregardless of whether or not it was locked, the Injured Mare began to walk away from the room, down what must have been another hall. It disappeared into the darkness. Rarity let out a sigh, her head falling.

"Why am I still here?" She asked herself. She was still tired, and thought about trying to go back to sleep. She knew that it would be unwise to sleep in an unguarded room, no matter how fatigued she was. She had to force herself to twist her body so she could hang her legs over the left side of the gurney. She slowly slid off the side of the gurney, settling down on weak and shaking legs. She felt a stabbing pain in the side of her chest as she lowered her front hooves to the ground, but dismissed it, feeling quite familiar with pain by now. She moved, rather sluggishly to the small table under the window, picking up the small brown bottle and looking it over. It was small, barely fitting in the cleft of her hoof, with a picture of Flim and Flam, the two brothers holding a leg on the others shoulder. The bottle proudly proclaimed: 'Flim and Flam's Mighty Restorative Drink: One drink will bring you back from the brink.'

She used her magic to remove the small white cap, and placed the lip to her nose. The liquid inside smelt like death and she had to hold back a cough as the repugnant smell lingered in her nostrils. She tilted it back slightly, holding it up just an inch or two from her mouth. She hoped Free Fall was telling the truth about the drink. She drank it as quickly as possible, swallowing it before her tongue had a chance to register the taste. She was gasping when she finished, but she already felt better, the pain in her side and the fatigue were both gone.

She had finished the bottle, placing it back on the table, and moving to the other side of the room with renewed vigor. She moved to the couch, looking down at the strange device on it. She lifted the object into the air with her magic and gave it a closer inspection, and found notes scrawled on the boxy side of it:

'Insert one coin for 12 shots. Warning! This particular device is extremely loud! Wear ear protection!'

She looked at the coins on the couch. She lifted one up and looked all over the item for a slot. It was on the top, and she slid a coin in, hearing the sound of what seemed to be metal ball bearing falling down a short drainage pipe. She tried to look in the slot and could see nothing, so she began to inspect it again. She looked at the small trigger at the bottom, pointing the metal tube on the thing to her right, and ,with her magic, gave it a small pull.

The noise that erupted from it was deafening, it was so loud her ears were ringing and she had developed a headache in the split second after the noise first erupted. It had bucked in her magical grip, leaving a small hole in the wall just above her eye level. She let the ringing stop and hovered her eye over the hole in the wall. Whatever had come out of the tube had gone straight through the wall. The strange thing was a very potent weapon.

She searched around the rest of the room for her jacket, but there was nowhere else to really look, besides under the gurney. She had no flashlight, radio, or her knife. She had the new weapon but without a flashlight, what good would it do?

She collected her courage and moved to the white door of the room. It was actually just a push door, so the Injured Mare could have come in, had it chosen to do so. She pushed it open, letting what little light in the room light up the hall before her. Out of the corner of her eye she saw a small box with a yellow switch on it. Without leaving the room, she thrust a leg out and flipped it. The hum of florescent lights in the hallway beginning to warm up was reassuring. The lights in the hall burst to life with a speed that startled Rarity, along with the images taped to the far wall.

The wall opposite of her door was covered in photos, organized into the shape of heart, each one was of her and her family, some with tiny Sweetie Bell and others before than, but in each and every single one of them, Rarity was slightly injured, yet her parents nor she herself seemed to notice the wounds, even if each wound was large or grotesque. The most disturbing aspect of the photos was the blood that was smeared on each, directly over wherever the wound was on her body in the photo.

Before any formal speculation could be made, the sound of something heavy and wet setting down on the tile floor could be heard to her left, where the Injured Mare had walked off. Rarity turned, pointing her strange weapon down the hall. The monster that slowly turned the corner was familiar, it looked just like the one from the house that had been intersected by the grocery store. The one Blueblood had killed. It reeked of soapy water and shampoo. It moved with no grace, barging around the corner once its water logged eyes spotted her. It was a healthy twenty or so feet away.

Rarity aimed the strange weapon as best she could. She gave the trigger another pull, and it buckled upward, the slug slamming forcefully into its right leg. It gave out a lout gasp as water began to pour out of the limb. It collapsed in on itself, and unlike the one back in that house, it died than and there. Part of her wanted to put a round in the other leg, chest and head just to be sure, but she felt it would be unnecessarily cruel to do so. She walked in the opposite direction of the body, noting the other doors of the hospital. There were three on each side with a larger one at the end of the hallway, scrawled on it in bold letters that could be seen from the far side of the hall was the word 'Freedom'.

She checked that door first, and found that it was actually to hot to touch. Her hoof burnt from the second of touch she had given it. As soon as she touched it, the lights flickered out as well. She turned back around, wondering what would be waiting for her to fight next. She stopped wondering about that though, on account that when she turned to face the monster she had just killed, and her hospital room door, she found that the gurney of her room was now in the center of the hall. She stared at it, then slowly approached it. She gave it quizzical looks, as if it could see them and would explain itself. As she neared it, only a foot or two away, it suddenly lurched forward, throwing itself at her. She jumped to the side, pushing it as well at it hurtled at her. She landed on her side, looking at the gurney that was slowly wheeling down the hall, into the darkness. The sound of hooves running caught her attention.

Looking up at the hallway the monster had come from, she made out the outline of a filly.

"Sweetie Bell?" She cried, standing up and giving chase, moving around the body of the wet monster, and rounding the corner in time to see Sweetie Bell run into a well lit room, the Injured Mare was staring out at her through the open door. It seemed to not notice Sweetie Bell, and allowed her to run past it. Rarity charged the door, hoping to get to it in time. She almost got her hoof in the small crack as she threw herself at it. It closed and locked, just as her hoof slammed against it, followed by her body.

She silently cursed, standing up, as the lights turned themselves back on. She spun around, hoping that it was just a weird part of the town, and not another monster. The lights revealed that there were only two doors in this part of the hall, one on either side of her. She slowly sidestepped to the closest one to her, and looked at it. Trying to find its handle. It was made of wood, and a golden placard on it read 'Patient Files'. She looked over her shoulder to see that the other door read 'Eyes'. She found the golden handle, and slid into the room.

It was well lit, with a lamp on either side of the center of the room, a small writing desk against the far wall, and a cabinets lining the walls to her right and left. She approached the writing table first, looking over its perfectly polished surface to find three manilla envelopes, laid out left to right. The first was labeled with her name, the second read 'Sweetie Bell', and the third, which was further away from the other two, said 'Free Fall'. On all three of them was a stamp, declaring they were folders from the Silent Mane Psychology Department.

She opened hers first, and was shocked by how much was in it. There was two entire papers, front and back, that listed only her admission dates to the Ponyville Hospital. There weren't even any spaces between the dates. She went to the next page, which was just a list of admission details, but it only focused on her injuries.

'12 counts of accidents in the bathroom leading to near asphyxiation due to water.'

'11 counts of accidents with knife or other bladed utensils, always deep enough to cause wounds that require immediate medical attention, but never scarring.' On the margin, next to this was: 'Patient showed no self-harming signs. Parents?'

'7 counts of accidents involving stairs.'

The list went on, but there were almost 100 accidents altogether. The rest of the papers, a whole twenty in all, were notes from the attending physician, including what appeared to be a transcript of two doctors conversation.

'Dr. Colt (Or C): "Shes being abused. You know it Shrinker. Its classic Munchhausen By Proxy. "

Dr. Shrinker (Or S): "Thats all well and good that you have an opinion Dr. Colt, but I am the staff psychiatrist, and if there was Munchhausen involved, it would be obvious. Ponies suffering from Munchhausen syndrome don't wait two or three months to cause their child injury. It doesn't fit the criteria. And if I just start telling them they have it, I could get hit with malpractice."

C: "That a load of manure and you know it. You're just scared that somepony is gonna find out that it went undiagnosed for so long. Why don't you stop being a coward and just stallion up to a mistake you made. You should have caught it when I first sent them to you, last year."

S: "Don't you dare try to accuse me of not believing every little idea you bring in here. You've been wrong more than enough for me. You always come in here, claiming you're right, I'm wrong, but when the Board hears about it, I'm the one who takes the heat."

C: "Fine. Let it go. If she gets hurt worse, crippled, or outright dead, its on your head, Shrinker!"

S: "Get the hay out of my office!"

Rarity looked at the papers. The last one was a page ripped from a medical dictionary, telling her what Munchhausen by proxy was:

** 'Münchausen syndrome by proxy** (**MSbP** or **MBP**) is a controversial term that is used to describe a behavior pattern in which a caregiver deliberately exaggerates, fabricates, and/or induces physical, psychological, behavioral, and/or mental health problems in those who are in their care. With deception at its core, this behavior is an elusive, potentially lethal, and frequently misunderstood form of child abuse or medical neglect that has been difficult to define, detect and confirm. The name "Münchausen syndrome by proxy" is derived from Münchausen syndrome, but it is important to distinguish one from the other, as they describe very different (but related) conditions. Ponies with Münchausen syndrome have a profound need to assume the victim and will exaggerate complaints, falsify tests, and/or self-inflict illnesses. MSbP perpetrators, by contrast, are willing to fulfill their need for positive attention by hurting _their own child_, thereby assuming the sick role by proxy. At times, they are also able to assume the hero role and garner still more positive attention, by appearing to care for and 'save' their child.'

She didn't believe it. That Doctor Colt had to have made a mistake. She forced the file to the side, and opened Sweetie Bell's. It was almost the exact same as her own, just the number of accidents was much smaller. There were no notes in the folder, just the hint that the same thing that had happened to Rarity was happening again. She placed the folder on top of hers. She was furious that anypony would even hint that her parents would act so terribly to their own children.

She looked at Free Falls folder. She didn't know if it was right of her to look at it. Eventually she wanted to just leave the room. She finally slid his folder over , placing it in front of herself, and flipping it open. The first paper was the psychological report of his mother, Star Walker. It had black ink on most of it, but more than enough of it was legible. She was deemed a 'threat to society at large, even though she wanted only the continued destruction of her adopted sons life, if a pony could act so callously to another, than how easy would it be for them to cause harm to ponies outside of their own family? She wanted nothing more than to alienate him to the rest of the world, and turn him into a cynical, hateful and spiteful colt. The current accusation made towards her is child abuse made up of the following criteria: Starvation, forced labor, psychological, physical and mental damage (consisting of long periods of time where Free Fall was forced to live in the basement with the lights off, accounting for his paranoid obsession with light) and attempted forced retardation (Free Fall himself does not know how to read, count past ten, or even color inside the lines of a coloring book). As a note to either the colts endurance or will power, he seems generally happy and aloof, and shows incredible mental faculties, until mention or visual sighting of his mother or father. As an experiment, we showed him a picture of his mother. He behaved as if she were in the room with him. Free Fall took a submissive stance and refused to respond to outside stimulus, staring at the picture instead, for over ten hours, when we finally took the picture away so he could/would eat. What could she have done to him that caused him to behave that way? She admits to torturing him, and the abuse, and will not go into detail about it but he calls us liars when we tell him about it. Free Fall is to be separated from his mother, as decided by Princess Celestia herself, may she rule eternal. - Dr. Colt'

Rarity was about to close the folder, despite there being at least ten more pages of notes, when she felt something thick hidden underneath the papers. Moving the papers aside, there was a tape player underneath. She lifted it up, it was a small black box with the control buttons on top. She opened it up, and read a small white label on the blue tape, it read: First Interview. She also realized that there was another tape on the back side of the player, with no label on it.

She pressed play on the first tape. A steady hiss of static followed for a few moments, and then a mares voice.

"What are we in for today?" She was talking with a sweet tone, the kind one would give to a crying child.

"Um. My wing." A much younger voice replied, it was a colts, and had a familiar edge to it.

"Alright, well, lets have a look see." There was a short couple of seconds with no sound, and then a faint whimper broke it. "That's a pretty nasty break. What happened?"

"Nothing."

"Oh, come now. You can tell me. I won't tell your mother."

"I did something bad."

"Yes?"

"I was...flying...outside."

"And?"

"I was flying outside."

The mare paused at this, and the silence returned. "Why is flying outside a bad thing?"

"Mo- Star Walker says I'm not supposed to go outside."

"So you broke a rule, and in your attempt to get back inside before she noticed, you hit something?"

"No."

"Then how did your wing break?"

The colt didn't reply. He was silent for a few seconds before he finally said, "I broke the rules."

The silence returned for a last time, as the mare quietly whispered to herself, "She broke his wing." The play button jutted out of top of the tape player, signifying the tape was over. Rarity placed it back in its folder, and left it there. When he had said Star Walkers name, she had known who it was. Free Fall.

She had no right to know these things unless Free Fall wanted to tell her himself. But from what she had read, it made sense why he was in her nightmare.

They both had parents that had done extensive damage, even if their minds blocked it all out for years...


	21. Eyes

Eye's on you

Rarity felt a deep sense of pain at the words of Doctor Colt, finding it hard to believe that her parents had abused her and her sister just for attention. She stared at the folders for a few more moments, finally deciding to reread Free Falls, after all, there could still be something damning in his past that could cement what Blueblood said. She had to admit that believing anything that Prince had said was hard to do, but it would be foolish to place complete trust, or lack thereof, into ponies she had just recently met, especially when one remembered the context of where she met them. She also remembered that Free Fall never denied the accusation. She glanced at his medical folder and wondered if she should have read it. She had little right, but needed to know, if only to prove she could trust him. She found the folder to be disturbing to even touch. She also realized that by virtue of what she had just read, Free Fall might have gone his entire life without any real friends or family, an outcast. She wondered if it was to late to perhaps offer him the hoof of friendship.

She forced these thoughts from her head, focusing on the task of finding her sister. She turned away from the desk, and walked to the door, opening it slowly, and peeking out through the crack of the door, to see that the hall was still empty. She slid into the hall, closing the door quietly behind her, and moving across the hall to the door labeled 'Eyes'. She wondered if it was an optometrist, but figured that the town rarely used the actual meanings of anything. She took a few steadying breaths and pushed the door open. She stepped into a small, well lit, bathroom.

It was the bathroom from her dreams, the very dreams that had plagued her into coming to this horrific town. The bathtub was on the far wall, a small shelf attached to the wall above its lip was full of shampoos and scented candles, with a window to the right of it. To the left was a wash basin with a mirror. As she looked around the room, a cold draft found its way in through the door, and the water of the bathtub turned itself on. Rarity approached the tub, looking into it. It was sparkling clean, and as she moved to inspect the water faucet, to see why or how it turned itself, she saw movement at the corner of her eye. She jumped away from the tub, spinning and pointing her loud weapon at the source.

A filly was standing over the bathtub, stretching out over the lips to reach a bottle of bubble bath. She took a pink bottle in her hooves and poured the majority of its contents into the tub. As Rarity watched, she realized quite easily that it was her younger self. The filly watched the water fill up for a moment or two, bouncing her head as she silently hummed to herself. When the water was halfway full, the filly lifted herself over the side of the tub and slid into the water. Rarity watched as her younger self sculpted bubbles into the form of a stallion and allowed it to linger as she reclined in the tub.

The handle of the bathroom door began to shake. Filly Rarity moved her lips, but no sound came out. The handle continued to shake, and the filly asked another question. The handle stopped. Filly Rarity slid into the water. She submerged her head, letting the warm water wash over her.

The door slowly cracked open. Her father entered, walking quietly enough that his hooves made no noise on the tiled floor. He was as thin as she remembered him to be when she was young, packing on the extra weight of his later years after the birth of Sweetie Bell. He was still sporting his thick mustache. He approached the side of the tub, holding himself far back enough that the filly in the water would be unable to see him. He took a few quick, ragged breaths before he launched himself over the lip of the tub, his hooves catching the unsuspecting filly and forcing her to the bottom of the tub hard enough for a thud to be heard through the water.

Rarity had watched in silent horror as her nightmare played itself out before her, but she had finally had enough of the truth. She pushed past the feelings of dread and terror, and placed a hoof on her father. Instead of being some sort of apparition like she thought it was going to be, it turned to reveal the blank emotionless face of the large wet pony monster. It gurgled at her, water dripping from its pores. The filly in the tub was underneath the surface, slowly emitting a cloud of red into the bubbly water that was surely blood.

Before Rarity could react, the thing shoved her back, its spongy skin sinking around her like a conforming mattress. She was thrown back, into the wash basin, hitting her back and head against the hard porcelain. She felt glass fall onto her as the mirror above her broke from the impact. A large piece landed between her legs, catching itself on her thigh, leaving a small crimson trail as it slid to the ground. The reflection of the glass showed her father, as he was meant to be, while the monster attempted to use its momentum to attack her again.

Rarity didn't feel panicked, she felt like the truth of what she had just seen had numbed her to much. She felt the strange noise making weapon in her magical grasp, lifted it to face the monster and pulled the trigger. The sound was once again deafening, but she couldn't muster the concern to cover her ears while they rang. The monster collapsed on the ground, the water of its body seeping out of it to cover the entire floor of the small bathroom. She let her head fall, knowing the thing she had just killed for the third time was the lost memory of her father. She felt a pain rising in her chest, and tried to fight back her tears, but quickly lost the fight, and crumpled onto her side. She sobbed openly and loudly, chocking up after a few minutes from the struggle of trying to breath through the chest wrenching sobs. In a flash, all the memories came back. Her mind had blocked all the pain and suffering, from her mother once pushing her down six stairs, to her father slamming a door shut on one of her hooves. The memories flooded in, one after the other, and with each new one, she found more sobs and tears to accompany them.

After a long while, her sobs subsided, only a little though. She thought that if her parents had this Munchhausen by proxy, then they weren't doing those things to be cruel, but because they were just different in the head. The still loved her, they just had a problem. She felt a little better about that. And now that she knew the truth, she could help them, get them the help they needed. They could still be a happy family.

She calmed down when the sound of something metal rattling into the bathtub caught her attention. She stood on tired and shaky legs, peering over the side of the tub, to see a key with a small chain and ball attached to it. She lifted it with her magic and brought it for closer inspection. The ball and chain were like those used by prisons, and the key had nothing special about it. She took it, wanting any excuse to leave the bathroom. She entered the hall, finding it quiet and empty with a puzzling new development. To the left of the room, back towards where she had woken up, the entire hall was filled with gurneys. They were stacked all the way up to the roof.

But that was alright, she wanted the door to her right, where the Injured Mare and Sweetie Bell had gone. She placed the key in a small slot on the right side and pushed it open. The other side was the familiar stone tower room from the hotel, yet there was only one tower and the strange warm glow was gone. She entered, spotting Free Fall standing amongst where the pillars had once been, this time though he was on the ground. The door closed behind her, and much to her surprise, disappeared from existence. She cleared her throat as she neared him, not wanting to startle him.

"Free Fall?" She asked, wanting to be sure it wasn't another monster like her father had been.

"Yeah. I'm still here." His voice was still soft, but there was an obvious hint in it that he was annoyed.

"That's a peculiar thing, I could have sworn that you came to see me while I was under in the hospital. Why are you here? I thought that you had perhaps found your truth." She moved to sit next to him, but as she approached his left side, he turned to his right, giving her his back. She noticed that where his front hooves touched, small bloody imprints stood out on the floor, before fading away.

"I thought so to. But there was one last piece of the puzzle. I had to come here to the hospital to find it." His head was lowered, so the natural dark of the room made it impossible to see his face.

"I thought this room was in the hotel? How is it here as well?" She wanted to change the subject, trying to cheer him up.

"When I was colt I used to imagine what it would be like to be one of those ancient Pegasus Cliff dwellers, out in the far west. I used that thought for when I was in the basement. It made the dark less scary. This is the only safe spot for me in this town. Its a piece of the memory of that time"

Her plan backfired, so she decided to just go straight to the heart of the matter.

"What was the final piece of your truth? If you don't mind me asking, of course." He sighed at the question.

"Could it wait? I already have to finish this nightmare. Can we talk about it in the real world?" She heard herself cough at the words 'real world'. She was pretty sure it was the real world, just altered by their perception. He was caught off guard by the sound and brought his head up and turned it. For only a brief second, she saw his face. His left eye was missing, a clean eye socket was staring back at her. He realized this, and thrust his head back into the darkness.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean for you to see that." He sounded like he was scolding himself.

"Its okay, really. You don't have to hide...that from me. I don't intend to judge you." She placed a hoof on his shoulder, to keep him from moving, and positioned herself next to him, on his left, laying in the dust despite her inner protests, to show him she was unfazed by his injury. He seemed to calm down, but he still held his head low.

"Perhaps we could sit here for just a moment. Enjoy the company of a friend before we go on to whatever this tacky town has in store for us." She smiled at him, trying to convince him, even if he couldn't see it with his bad eye.

"We're...friends?" He sounded like he didn't believe her, like the words were far to foreign to be understood.

"I admit, I don't know you very well, but I would like to try to. So what if I were to say 'friends-to-be', instead?"

He smiled. "I'd like that."

They sat in silence for a moment, staring into the dark abyss as they reflected inwardly about their own personal demons. She knew she had somewhere to be, but she was terrified to continue. She had a feeling that he was too, and she just wanted a minute or two to let her own nerves settle...


	22. Friends And Health

Friends-to-be and Health.

A siren sounded in the distance, the noise was long and distorted. Rarity looked at Free Fall, who had laid down on the dirt with her some time ago. His face seemed to darken as the sound came to a end.

"What in Equestria was that?" She asked, sitting up and looking around the room of pillars.

"Its a warning. We have a little bit before monsters will start to swarm this place. We should start getting ready to go. The doors are on the other side of the pillar." He replied, standing up, and stretching.

"Free Fall, I need to tell you something. You have my sincerest apologies about accusing you of trying to harm my sister. I was wrong." His face showed how surprised he was, almost as if he didn't want the apology. "Could you forgive me?"

"Of course. You were just worried about your sister."

"There's something else." His eye brow rose.

"I read the report about your mother. What she did to you. When we are out of here, if you ever want somepony to talk to, I will always be willing to listen." He seemed to be about to cry. His face was contorted as he tried to hold back tears.

"Nopony has ever wanted to listen before. Why would you want to?" She smiled at this, and reached out with her right hoof.

"Because we are friends-to-be and that is what friends-to-be do for each other." He reluctantly took her hoof, giving it a weak shake.

"Now, however, I need to look at your..injury." She gestured towards his left eye. He was taken back, visibly flinching when she pointed at it. "I just want to make sure it isn't infected or anything of that nature."

He moved a little closer, his remaining eye staring at the ground in embarrassment. She placed her hoof on his right cheek to steady his head. He almost pulled back, but stopped when he saw her smile. It was different than when his mother used to look at his injuries. She would always prod them with a hoof, usually making the wounds that much more painful and bigger. Rarity looked at his empty eye socket, it was a dark red, showing that the blood was coagulated and would need to be cleaned out, but at least he didn't show any signs of infection.

"Does it still hurt?" She asked, looking at his good eye.

"A little. It aches from time to time." The siren was beginning to sound again. "We only have a short time left."

"Can I try something? It might help with the pain." His eye looked at the hoof on his cheek.

"Sure." She brought her other hoof up, and slowly moved it over his empty socket. He didn't move, but as the hoof touched, he whimpered, more out of fear than pain. She began to put a little pressure on the socket.

"That feels a lot better. Thank you." She kept her hoof there for a moment longer before she pulled away. He smiled again, blinking a few time as the pain slowly ebbed back into the empty socket.

"May I ask what happened to you...to your eye?" He was taken back, a hoof moving up to cover it. "I'll understand if you don't want to talk about it."

"My step mother. I-I found her, here." He pointed at the door she had come through, "In that hallway there was a room that was on fire. She was there. She asked me for something. I gave it to her, so she could escape this place."

"You gave her your eye? Why?" Now she was taken back, his reason was outlandish.

"Would you want somepony stuck here?" She opened her mouth to reply, but chose not to say anything. She would never condemn somepony to have to live in that town, no matter what they did.

"We should probably get going. The third siren is when they start to come out..."


	23. Finale

Finale

Free Fall led Rarity around the pillar, to reveal two wooden doors built into the stone wall. They were simple doors, with a wooden handle. As they approached, Rarity noted that Free Fall was looking more grim and worried. She figured that if her last trial was to defeat the Injured Mare, his was probably similar. She wondered what kind of monsters he had run into during his time in the town.

As they arrived at doors, he took the one on the right, sitting down before it. "I'm not ready." He said solemnly, his head lowered. Rarity let out a quiet sigh.

"What is it that you have to face?" She asked, trying to focus on her own door. They both needed to go soon. The third siren began, its was louder than the other two, to the point that it shook the entire room. He didn't have time to respond. She used her magic to open his door, and pushed him through. He made no attempt to stop her, merely looking back as he landed in a dark field, in what looked like wet grass. The look of fear and betrayal on his face almost made her second guess herself as she slammed his door closed. She had saved him from the coming monsters, right? She shook off the feelings of regret, and opened her own door, and had a single hoof in when she heard the sound of loose rocks being tossed around by hooves behind her.

She turned her head around to see that the light was slowly fading in and out, revealing the swarm of mannequins flooding into the room through the darkness. She pushed herself through her door, landing on the soft carpet of her own home, the Carousel Boutique. Yet it was different, the entire layout was wrong. The floor was open and much wider than the Boutique usually was, with no furniture, and the round walls had no doors. The most striking feature was her sister laying at the far side of the room, asleep, at the foot of the Injured Mare. It ran a bandaged limb over Sweetie Bells mane. It looked up at her rather quizzically, its head tilted to the left as if it were a dog trying to understand the words of its master.

Rarity watched in terror as it gently nuzzled the sleeping filly before stepping over her, like a mother protecting her daughter. It reared up, kicking its front legs wildly before bringing them down in a loud stomp. It was challenging her.

"Wait! It doesn't have to be this way. Please, just let me take my sister, and we can call it even." It made no response other than to paw at the ground with its hoof. Before Rarity could try and convince it to be peaceful, it charged, lowering its head to reveal the scalpel that was still attached to its neck. She brought the loud metal gun down and pulled the trigger. The noise was still deafening, she just couldn't get over that fact. The projectile hit it in the leg, sending it sprawling on the ground, limb over limb. It made no noise still, rolling on the ground, writhing in agony.

Rarity thought about putting another shot into its head, but she knew that it wouldn't do any good. She had to do something else, not kill the thing. It was, after all, just a conglomeration of her own memories. The memories of her parents illness. She felt some strange sense of pity for it. It was forever trapped in a world of misery inflicted by those it loved so much.

The noise had the side effect of waking up Sweetie Bell however, who woke with a start, but Rarity was busy watching her foe to really notice the filly staring at her. Rarity watched as the Injured Mare finally recovered, standing up on its three good legs, trying to reorient itself towards Rarity. Rarity did her best to aim at the things other leg, wanting to incapacitate it over killing it.

It began to charge again, and Rarity pulled the trigger. In the split second before the projectile left the chamber, Rarity pulled the strange weapon up, pointing it in the air as best she could. Sweetie Bell had ran under the Injured Mare, and was now shielding the taller monster with her body.

"Stop!" Her voice cracked more than usual. "Don't hurt my sister, you bully!"

Rarity was taken back, and felt a wave of heat rush into her face as she became livid.

"Sweetie Bell, its a monster." But the words were lost on the filly. The monster said nothing, but Sweetie Bell looked at it as if it were, and nodded her head.

"Rarity says that you have to remember. She says it isn't about forgiving. Its about accepting the truth, no matter what." Sweetie Bell still stood before the creature, which nodded rather enthusiastically. Rarity almost lost it, she had to contain herself from screaming at her sister. She was so furious she thought about just lowering the strange weapon and finishing the Injured Mare, no matter what the consequences were. It seemed to sense this, and moved around Sweetie Bell, almost as if it were trying to protect her.

This caused Rarity to have a spark of understanding. She lowered her head, and allowed the strange weapon to fall to the floor. She closed her eyes.

"I am sorry. I didn't want to believe what happened with our parents, because I thought that to accept it, would be to accept that my childhood was a lie. I believed that to accept it was to accept that my parents were monsters. They aren't, they just have a problem and need help. I believed that to accept it would change who I was, it did after all, change where I came from. But I understand now. You aren't a monster, your the truth. You accepted it and moved on, seeing that it was just a tragic flaw of a loving mother and father. Accepting it wont change anything but how I see my parents, and even then, that's still my choice. I can't ever forget the pain they caused me, but I understand now why you ran away from me Sweetie Bell. You were afraid that our parents hated you, cause you never knew I went through the same thing. Sweetie Bell, I am so sorry that I never noticed what they were doing. To you. To me. I could have stopped it so long ago, and I didn't. Could you forgive me, Sweetie Bell?"

She opened her eyes. The Injured Mare was across from her, but Sweetie Bell no longer sat before the monster, but now was at Rarities feet. The Injured Mare laid down, resting its head on its hooves as its back body slowly turned to ash, and the entire thing blew away.

Rarity looked at her sister, who smiled back up at her. "Is it time to go home, Rarity?" She seemed so oblivious to what had just happened. She had seen the monster as the real Rarity because it accepted the past, instead of running away from it, or pretending it never happened. Now that Rarity accepted the horror of her childhood, she was what Sweetie Bell saw as her sister, pure and whole.

"Sweetie Bell, I missed you ever so much. When we get out of here, we need to have a long talk about mom and dad, alright?" Sweetie Bell nodded, but the look on her face betrayed her concern about the topic. She obviously didn't want to lose her mother and father, and smart filly that she was, she knew that was a possible outcome. "Don't worry Sweetie Bell. We will never lose mom or dad, or each other." She nuzzled her sister's forehead, who replied in kind, giggling as she did so. The door had appeared on the far wall, Rarity noticed, and gave her sister a loving push in the right direction as they began to walk out, giving the pile of ash a healthy distance.

As they opened the door of what they assumed was a part of their own home, they walked out into the morning air of Ponyville, just as the sun was beginning to rise, looking back, their home was jus as they had left it before the terrible trip to Silent Mane.

"Rarity?" Sweetie Bell asked, looking back at her sister.

"Yes, Sweetie Bell?"

"Do you think Mr. Free Fall made it out okay?"

Rarity wondered for a second, and became lost in thought for a few moments.

"I imagine he did Sweetie Bell. I imagine he's fine, flying around somewhere, enjoying life for the first time." She felt terrible lying to her sister. She knew from the moment she had pushed him through that door, she may have doomed him. She knew that his mind was fragile. If he did survive, she could only imagine the anger, and possible hatred, he would have towards her.

And although she would think of him from time to time, she had much more important work to do with her own family...

The fresh air smelt wonderful. For far to long Free Fall had been stuck in that town, and now he was finally free. Walking down Mane Street, in Silent Mane, he cared little for the stares of the ponies he passed. Thought the cost was high, he thought to himself as he placed his newly attached, magically powered, prosthetic left leg up to his glass left eye. The final battle had been more demanding then he had ever thought. He didn't know where to go now, but anywhere was better than Silent Mane...

Ending theme song: Werewolf by CocoRosie (Rarity)

I want Love (Studio Remix) From the Silent Hill 3 OST


	24. Three Months Later

Three Months Later

Rarity quietly opened the door to her bedroom, slowly creeping in just a little past midnight. She had just come from Canterlot, where one of the greatest psychiatrists in Equestria was helping her parents deal with Munchhausen's, and she enjoyed being there to help them along. They had made great strides, including the most difficult step of forgiving themselves.

Rarity crawled into her bed, noting in the darkness that there was already a lump on the far side. She lifted the sheets and crawled over to it, resting her head on a warm pillow of a chest. It moved, bringing its own head down to kiss her forehead, its singular front leg draping itself on her shoulders as she lay on her side.

"Hey, welcome home. I stayed up for a while, but I laid down for a just a minute or two and must have dozed off. How was it?" Free Fall's soft voice showed how tired he was, struggling to stay awake just to talk to her.

"Marvelous, darling. They are doing so much better. Sweetie Bell is going with me next time. They really want to see her." She said back, nuzzling his chest. They laid in silence for a few minutes. His breathing became shallow. He was asleep. She remembered how he had stumbled into Ponyville, doing side jobs for bits. He had never meant to see her again, but she had been so excited, she had completely wiped away his fear that she wanted nothing to do with him. He was still hard on himself, and didn't have the highest self esteem. But now he had a home, her friends had accepted him with much more gusto than she anticipated, especially Twilight, who gladly tutored him in reading and math. But they all enjoyed being around him, for different reasons. Fluttershy liked helping him, and teaching him about her animal friends, and how they could be his friends when nopony else was around. Applejack and Rainbow Dash both enjoyed his help around the farm, and they even began to share their experiences from Silent Mane.

He was generally a well functioning member of society, even if he still had bad days where his past came back to bring him down, but the problems were the smaller things that still haunted him from his childhood, and they dealt with that as they came. The biggest strides were getting over his fear of strangers, the dark, and intimacy.

Rarity had developed feelings for him some time after he came to town. She enjoyed being around him, finding it almost impossible to not smile while he was around. He was sweet, caring and was true to himself. Sometimes he would admit to not liking one of her designs, but he was never trying to mean about it. When she had told him how she felt, he had admitted that he didn't know if it was because she was the first real friend, or if he honestly felt a deep admiration for her, but he wanted to try anyway. In a way, he held the positive aspects of a prince, lacking only the title.

The rest, she thought to herself as she wrapped her front legs around his stomach and buried her face into his chest, was history...


End file.
